


So Close

by anotherwinchesterfangirl



Category: Original Work
Genre: F/M, Fluff and Smut, Original Character(s), Original Fiction, Past Rape/Non-con, Rape Aftermath, Romance, like LOTS of SMUT
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-08-23
Updated: 2019-02-11
Packaged: 2019-07-01 12:57:11
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 10
Words: 27,458
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15774561
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/anotherwinchesterfangirl/pseuds/anotherwinchesterfangirl
Summary: When Olivia's world was abruptly and forcefully shattered, the only way she knew how to deal was to run. So she did, moving 500 miles to a new city and a new life - and leaving her boyfriend Ryan with no explanation and no goodbye. Now, they're in the same city again, and every feeling they ever had for each other is still very much there. They rekindle that flame, and it burns HOT. But can they untangle the knot that still ties them to their past? Or will Olivia's inability to confront her demons cause her to lose Ryan for good?





	1. Chapter One

**Author's Note:**

> I originally wrote this for NaNoWriMo 2016, and I've been sitting on the draft forever. Here goes round two of editing and trying to put it out there (because otherwise it's just sitting in my google docs folder gathering dust). We'll see how far I get this time. :) 
> 
> Warning for Rape/Non-Con for a scene that will happen in Chapter Twelve and its aftermath.

Ryan glances down at the phone in his hand, checking the address yet again as he exits the parking garage and makes a right. Why did he agree to meet Zach so far away from his apartment on only his second day in the city? He should have stuck to places within walking distance. He could have taken the L, but it still freaks him out a little—the anxiety of catching a connection, the complicated maps. City traffic puts him a little on edge, but at least with driving he has a modicum of control. 

He shakes off the nerves as he makes his way down State Street in search of its intersection with Banks Avenue. The wind whips through his hair, and he stuffs his hands deep into his coat pockets. Winter in Chicago is proving to be a lot colder than he expected. Colorado wasn’t exactly  _ warm _ , but it was warmer than this. 

_ This will be fun _ , he tells himself. He’s not really a “happy hour on a Wednesday night” kind of guy. Maybe he  _ used _ to be, but that was a long time ago. But he hasn’t seen Zach in years, and Zach’s the only person he knows in the city. (Except for Olivia, but she doesn’t really count.) Plus he deserves a celebratory drink. Today was his first day as an assistant professor at Northwestern. Four classes to teach, a tiny corner of an office all to himself, actually getting to do something he loves, a decent paycheck (sort of), and the chance for tenure someday. After all the time and money he spent on school, he’s  _ finally _ getting somewhere. Sure beats working as a barista.

The place comes into view—a little boutique hotel on the corner with a fancy lobby and a scripty neon sign in the window that reads  _ Nino’s Restaurant & Bar—Open _ . He shoves his phone into the pocket of his new suit pants. He’s still dressed for work, and he vaguely hopes that he doesn’t look too uptight for this place. He runs a hasty hand through his hair and pulls open the door to the bar. 

The air is hazy with cigarette smoke and grease, but he sees her immediately. He shouldn’t—she isn’t even sitting in his natural line of sight, and he’s supposed to be scanning the place for Zach, not looking at the front right corner, practically behind him, at a table near the window—but he does. It’s like his eyes don’t want to see anything else. All the breath punches quick out of his lungs, the world slipping sideways under his feet. 

She looks different, older—no more purple streaks through her hair or thick black eyeliner—but also the same—same soft lines around her mouth, same sparkle in her eyes, same freckles scattered across her nose. Her hair’s grown long and is pulled back away from her face into a low ponytail that cascades over her shoulder, and she’s sitting with her legs crossed under the table, black pump dangling from her toes as she leans forward on her elbows. It takes Ryan a second to realize that she’s with a guy and they’re both laughing. She’s holding a half-full glass of red wine, dressed for a date in a simple black dress and hoop earrings. His heart pounds, desperate, frantic. Something that tastes like panic is crawling up the back of his throat and he’s not quite sure what that means.

He takes a lurching step forward—toward her—trying to regain his equilibrium, trying to  _ think _ . She sets down her wine and sits up straighter, nodding at something her date is saying. He’s stuck between going toward her and leaving immediately. 

“Ryan!” Zach’s low, booming voice snaps him out of the trance she has him in, and he looks up. Zach’s walking toward him, the tallest guy in the room by a long shot. His blond crew cut and broad shoulders make him look like a frat guy pretending to be a businessman. He looks exactly the same as he did when he was quarterback of the football team being crowned as prom king.

“Ryan!” Zach says again, a little too loudly, and Ryan whips his head around to see if Olivia heard, if she noticed him. He can’t decide if he wants her to see him or not. But she’s oblivious and so is her guy. She looks happy. She looks a lot happier than she did the last time he saw her. The memory makes his stomach twist.

He turns back to Zach, smiles, and gives him a hug and a slap on the back. He follows him up to the bar where he orders a beer. Zach orders a beer for himself and a shot of whiskey for each of them. 

“Whew!” Zach exclaims as the whiskey burns down their throats. “I feel like I’m in college again. How are you, man?” Zach asks, and Ryan catches himself looking at Olivia again—she tucks a stray strand of hair behind her ear and looks up at her date through dark eyelashes. He snaps his eyes back to Zach and takes a sip of his beer.

“I’m good,” he says, almost more to himself than to Zach. “I’m good.” He thought he was. Ten minutes ago he was. Now he’s not so sure. “How’ve you been?” He tries to swallow the tremble in his voice. He takes another sip of his beer and glances past Zach toward the window—he can just see Olivia over Zach’s shoulder. 

They talk about their jobs and how Ryan’s move went, their other friends who are scattered across the country and Zach’s recent wedding—god that hurts a bit—and Ryan can’t stop looking at Olivia. No matter what else he tries to look at, he keeps finding his eyes on her.

_ Is that guy her boyfriend? Or just a date?  _ A twisty, jealous part of him hopes it’s not serious.  _ Could he even be that lucky? _ It doesn’t  _ look _ serious—they haven’t touched at all (he is  _ not _ watching that closely,  _ fuck _ ), and the brightness of Liv’s smile noticeably dims as their conversation wanes on. Now she’s playing with a lock of her hair, twirling it around her finger, her eyes flicking up to the TV above her date’s head. Ryan looks down into his beer. 

What are the odds that they would end up in the same bar just after he moved into town? It has to mean something, right? Ryan doesn’t really believe in any sort of higher power, but what he wouldn’t give for something,  _ anything _ , indicating that this were true, that they’re somehow  _ meant _ to be together. Because no girl he’s been with since can compare to Olivia, and he knows he shouldn’t compare them but he always does. Because he thought she was  _ it _ for him, but then he lost her, and he’s never forgiven himself. Or her, if he’s honest. What they had was one in a million, and he doesn’t even know how he lost it. How he lost her. 

“Dude, isn’t that your girl?” Zach asks. Ryan realizes he’s busted and he feels terrible; Zach’s been watching the football game for at least the past five minutes. 

“What? Uh, no. No, not my girl.” He stammers, seeks solace in the last slug of his beer and signals the bartender for another. “I don’t have a girl.”

“But you were together, right? I mean, I’d transferred by that time, but I remember seeing pictures of you guys together. On Facebook or whatever.”

“What? Oh, yeah, yeah, we were. For a little while.”

“Didn’t work out, huh? Does she even know you’re here?” 

“Nah, man, and she’s not gonna. I’m not gonna bother her. She’s better off without me. It was a nasty… it wasn’t. We’re not friends. It’s better for everybody if I don’t say hi.” 

“Alright, man, whatever you say,” Zach shrugs and pulls his wallet out of his pocket. “Sorry to cut this short, but I’m getting old and I’ve gotta work in the morning.”

“That’s alright,” Ryan says as the bartender sets a fresh beer in front of him. “Thanks for hanging out.” 

“Dude, anytime. Let’s do it again soon,” Zach says as he lays a couple of bills on the bartop. He pulls on his coat and slaps Ryan on the shoulder. “Later.” 

Ryan finishes his beer fast, looking at the TV but not really watching it. He tries his hardest not to look at Olivia but it’s futile. They’re sharing a dessert now—he can’t tell what it is, but they’re both reaching their forks toward the plate in the middle of the table. Olivia’s favorite part of any meal was always dessert. 

Finally, he thunks his empty glass onto the bar. Just before he goes, he glances again at the table by the window, and before he does it he tells himself this will be the last time he looks. This was just a coincidence; it’s a big city, certainly he can coexist within the same two-hundred square miles as her and manage to avoid her from now on. He prepares himself a little, to drink in all of her that he can in these last two seconds that he’ll get to look at her. He wants to remember every detail that he can. The only thing he isn’t prepared for is for her to be looking back at him, wide-eyed and open-mouthed. 


	2. Chapter Two (Before)

“Liv, come on!” Amber’s voice carries easily up the stairs and down to the end of the hall where Olivia stands at the bathroom mirror, trying to wrangle her hair into some sort of acceptable form of a braid. Olivia sighs and leans out the bathroom door, returning with a shout of her own. 

“Don’t rush me! You’re the one forcing me to go!”

“Oh, shut up and just come on. We’re going to miss the whole party at this rate.” 

“Go by yourself then.” 

Amber appears in the bathroom doorway two seconds later. 

“Liv, this is our  _ last _ party of college, I’m not letting you miss it. I know you’ll regret it.”

“Why would I regret it? It’s not like partying is really my thing, you know.” Olivia finishes off the braid and ties it with a hair elastic. 

“You’ve been holing up in here for  _ weeks _ , ever since Dylan—”

“ _ Don’t _ ,” Olivia warns. 

“Fine,” Amber says, eyes rolling toward the ceiling. “But I’m still not letting you spend another night bingeing Gilmore Girls, okay? We’re getting out and having fun. Besides, it’ll be our last night out together. C’mon.  _ Please. _ ” She pouts, and even Olivia has to admit it’s fairly convincing.

“O- _ kay _ .” Olivia sighs and starts digging around in her makeup bag for a lip gloss. 

“Is that what you’re wearing?”

“Yeah, what’s wrong with it?” Olivia glances down at her jeans and v-neck top. She hasn’t picked out her shoes yet, but she’s considering boots. It’s early May, and it’s not exactly tropical in Northern Minnesota. “I was gonna wear boots. Think I should go for heels instead?” She looks up at Amber, who’s wearing a dress that barely covers her behind. “You’re going to freeze your ass off.” 

“Oh, shut up. No one ever got laid wearing jeans.”

“That’s not even close to true. Besides I  _ don’t _ need to get laid.” Olivia leans into the mirror and swipes gloss over her lips. 

“Yes, you do.” But Amber’s voice is already trailing down the hall.

“Where are you going?” Olivia asks, a little panicky. 

“To pick you out a new outfit!” 

Twenty minutes later, Olivia’s back in the bathroom, standing in front of the full-length mirror in a denim skirt, midriff-baring top, and heels.

“Amber, this is ridiculous. There was snow on the ground three weeks ago.” She attempts to tug the skirt, which is Amber’s, down to cover more of her bare thigh.

“It was 70 today! Besides, you look hot.” 

“I’m  _ not _ trying to get laid tonight, remember?”

“So? You can still look hot. Now, come on or we’re really going to miss the party. And you should put your hair down. Dylan’s gonna kick himself in the dick for cheating on you like he did.”

Olivia freezes in the middle of undoing her braid. Her heart constricts. “Dylan’s gonna be there?” She hates how small her voice sounds. 

“ _ Everyone _ is going to be there, Liv. You probably won’t even run into him. But even if he’s not there, word of how hot you are will definitely get back to him.”

Olivia doesn’t move. 

“Liv, c’mon. It’s gonna be fine.” Amber sidles up next to her and links their arms together. “I’ll be there the whole time, I swear to god. You can get drunk; I’ll only have two beers max so I can get us home. You deserve this.” 

“Really?” Olivia looks to her friend, hopeful. 

“ _ Yes _ really. Now let’s go.” 

The party is only two blocks away at a fraternity house, and it’s already wild when they get there. Music is pouring out of the windows as they walk up, the low bass beat reverberating up Olivia’s spine and nestling between her ribs. People are all over the front lawn, dancing and drinking. There’s a huge group of guys crammed onto the porch, one of them hoisted head first up over a keg, his friends holding his feet in the air as he gulps down beer. It’s disgusting. 

Amber stops to watch, and Olivia resists rolling her eyes. A tall guy with close cropped hair drops an arm around Amber’s shoulders, hands her a beer, leans down to whisper in her ear.

 

Olivia accepts the beer that is handed to her and leans against the porch railing, a little unsure of what to do, but trying to keep her cool. She makes a deal with herself that she can go home after a half an hour if she’s not having any fun. This is supposed to be fun, and there’s no reason to force herself to enjoy it if she isn’t. 

She’s sort of zoned out, lost in her own thoughts, when a guy steps in front of her. 

“Hi,” he says. It was the guy that was doing the kegstand and his breath smells like beer, but it isn’t terrible. He doesn’t look too drunk, but he’s sort of smiling like an idiot. 

“Hi,” Olivia replies, raising her eyebrows and taking a sip of her beer. 

“I’m Ryan,” he says. His eyes are that kind of bloodshot-glassy from too much alcohol but also soft and kind, and so blue they’re a little disconcerting. He’s wearing a t-shirt with the arms cut off and gym shorts, and he’s struggling a little bit to keep his balance. He anchors himself on the post behind Olivia, bracing his arm above her head. Despite her better judgement, she thinks he’s cute. 

“Olivia.” His smile is contagious, and she finds herself returning it even though she didn’t plan to. 

“I know.” His smile grows wider—the smile of a drunk person that has a secret. “Amber told me who you were.” 

“Amber put you up to this?” Her chest tightens, a flush of shame washing over her, and she shifts her weight to her other foot, slightly away from Ryan. Of course Amber had something to do with this. This is why she doesn’t come to parties. Why does it always have to be about hooking up?

“Yeah,” he says, leaning in a little. He’s totally in her bubble and she can smell his cologne now—spicy and musky and clean. He’s so close she can see the halo of green around his blue eyes. It’s sort of breathtaking. “Because I asked her for your number and she told me I had to get it myself.” 

“What?” Olivia can’t keep up with the conversation. It doesn’t help that all his words are bumping together and the music is so loud that she can barely hear him anyway. He runs a hand through his shaggy hair.  _ Is he nervous? _

“Yeah, I um—I see you around sometimes, and I just, you know…” he trails off and takes a gulp of beer out of his plastic red cup. 

“Oh,” Olivia says, a little noise of surprise. Ryan downs the rest of his beer and peers over into her cup. 

“D’you need another?” he asks. She shakes her head.

“No, no thanks, I’m good.” She thinks he’s probably had enough, but she’s not gonna say anything. 

Ryan nods and pauses, like he doesn’t want to leave her there because he’s afraid she’ll escape or something. 

“Come inside,” he says. “It’s at least a little warm in there.”

Olivia shrugs. “Okay,” she says, realizing that she’s shivering and her bare legs are covered in goosebumps. It’s can’t be more than fifty degrees out here; she never should have let Amber convince her to wear this outfit. 

She follows Ryan inside, twisting her way through the crowds of people in the living room. Inside is hot and full of people dancing, drinking, talking, kissing, shouting. The music is so loud she can’t hear anything else. She thinks Ryan is leading her toward the kitchen, so he can get another drink, but too late she realizes that they’re at the door to a bedroom. 

Her eyebrows shoot up and she nearly drops her drink. 

“Um… I have to. Go,” she says, and she sounds like an idiot. Why did she let Amber convince her to come to this party? She does not want to make out with a stranger in someone else’s dirty bedroom. 

“What? No,  _ no _ . I’m sorry.” He sways a little on his feet, looking down at her. He’s so tall, and the low ceilings in the hallway make him look like a giant. He holds his hands up in innocence. “I’m not trying to… get in your pants or anything, I swear. I was just gonna grab you a sweatshirt cause you look cold.” He pulls a key from the pocket of his shorts and unlocks the door, glances back at her over his shoulder. “I keep the door locked so no one but me can get any action in my bedroom.” He chuckles. “And so no one can pilfer my stuff.” 

“Oh,” Olivia says again.  _ Why can’t she be better at this? _

Ryan’s bedroom is  _ neat _ . The bed is even made, and this guy is just full of surprises. He pulls open a dresser drawer, pulls out a perfectly folded sweatshirt, and hands it to her. 

“Thank you,” Olivia says, and she means it. She sets her barely-touched beer on the top of his dresser and pulls the sweatshirt over her head gratefully, letting the sleeves hang past her hands. 

“So,  _ Olivia _ ,” Ryan says, emphasizing her name more than necessary, leaning back against his dresser. “Not a party girl, huh?” 

“That obvious?” She can tell he doesn’t mean it in a mean way. Now that she’s away from the noise and the crush of people, she feels a little better, less anxious. 

“Takes one to know one, you know? Let’s just say, if I didn’t live here I probably wouldn’t be here.”

“Why do you let your housemates throw crazy parties if you don’t like it?” she asks. She sits down on the edge of the bed. 

“Oh, you know. Gotta keep up my reputation.” He smiles, but she doesn’t think he’s kidding. “What are you doing here?”

“My roommate. Trying to get me out after… after a nasty breakup. This might be the first and only party I attend during my entire college career.”

“You graduating? Me too.”

“Yeah.” She pauses. “Scary isn’t it?”

He laughs, curling forward over his crossed arms—a real laugh, big and throaty, and it hits her right in the chest, fills up all her empty spaces inside. 

“Fuck yeah, it is. I mean, I’m supposed to have a  _ plan _ , but hell… I’ve got nothing.” 

“What’s your major?” she asks, feeling a little like a freshman again, but she wants to know nonetheless. 

“Philosophy and general studies.” He laughs again, a little self-deprecating. “What the fuck am I doing with my life?”

“Ha, same. I’m Art History.”

“What’s your dream job?”

“Museum curator.” She sighs. “Because there’s such high demand. You?”

“I’m aimless. I just like to talk about shit. Maybe law school? I don’t know.” 

He’s definitely got the charm to be a lawyer, with his easy smile and strong voice. “I think law school would suit you,” she says, and she means it. 

“Oh yeah? You barely know me,” he retorts, but there’s a glint of laughter in his eyes. 

“Well, you’re the one that brought me back to your bedroom. Must know you well enough.” He laughs again, and she likes the sound so much she wants to just keep making him laugh forever.

He glances down at her still untouched cup of warm beer sitting next to him on top of his dresser. 

“Hey, do you want something that isn’t nasty cheap beer?” he asks.

“Yes,” Olivia says, gratefully. She smiles. “I would love that.” 

Ryan pulls open another drawer of his dresser, the bottom one, and shoves aside a pile of gym shorts and pulls out a bottle of Jack Daniels. It clinks against another bottle as he lifts it out of the drawer.

“Do you like whiskey?” he asks, holding up the bottle. She nods. She sort of wonders if this guy has a drinking problem if he keeps bottles of whiskey in his dresser drawer, but she brushes the thought away. It’s not her place to judge anybody—if he has a whiskey problem, she has an ice cream problem. Especially since Dylan. 

“Did you really…” She pauses. She hasn’t had enough to drink yet to be this forward, but she has to know. And he’s giving her his full attention now; the full force of his blue-green eyes is on her and she has to say something. She takes a deep breath. “Did you really ask Amber who I was because you’d  _ seen me around _ ?” She bites her lip, anxious for his response. 

He grimaces a little, but then it morphs into a self-deprecating smile. He looks at the floor. “As embarrassing as it is, yeah. I see you in the library a lot. And just thought you looked pretty and… I don’t know I wanted to get to know you but I didn’t know how. So when you walked up tonight, and you were with Amber, who’s dating my housemate... Seems a little  _ kismet _ , don’t you think? I couldn’t let you walk by without… taking a chance.”

“Kismet?” Olivia asks, her voice wispy.  Her heart is swelling inside her chest.  _ What kind of guy says words like  _ kismet _? _

“Come with me, I want to show you something,” Ryan says. He reaches forward into the sleeve of her borrowed sweatshirt and grabs her hand, pulling her behind him as he leaves the room. He doesn’t bother to relock his bedroom door. 

Olivia doesn’t really know why she’s letting this boy lead her all over creation, but his hand is warm and gentle, his fingers wrapped softly around hers, holding on loosely, and she doesn’t want to let go of it. Ryan detours through the kitchen and fills a couple of cups with ice before taking her hand again. He smiles at her over his shoulder, his teeth perfectly straight and shiny white, a deep dimple appearing in his right cheek, and her knees actually wobble.

“Having fun, Liv?” Amber shouts over the music as they make their way back through the living room. She’s dancing with the guy that had his arm around her earlier, but she doesn’t have a drink in her hand. Olivia nods. 

She’s happy for the first time in  _ weeks _ , actually feels a giggle building up in her chest, about to escape her lips, when she hears his voice. 

“Dude, she’s so  _ hot _ . She puts out so much more than Olivia ever did.” 

She freezes on the spot, pulling her hand out of Ryan’s. He stops short and turns around. 

“What’s wrong?” Ryan’s asking, but there’s a roar of embarrassment in her ears and she can barely hear him. She squeezes her eyes shut, willing it away. All she wants is to just follow Ryan, this cute boy that actually seems to  _ like _ her. Why why  _ why _ is he here?

She opens her eyes and Ryan is looking at her. Over his shoulder, Amber is looking at her, her eyes a little panicky. Dylan must sense the pause in the air because he turns around and sees her, standing there in Amber’s microscopic skirt and some other guy’s sweatshirt, and he grins. 

“Oh, hey Liv.” 

“Don’t, Dylan.” Amber takes a possessive step forward.

“I think it’s up to Olivia if she wants to talk to me, Amber.” He says defensively. He turns back to Olivia. “How you doing, baby?” he asks, like she didn’t just hear what he was saying about her ten seconds before. 

Olivia can’t respond—her tongue is stuck to the roof of her mouth. She can’t even breathe. 

“Dude, back off. I don’t think she wants to talk to you right now.” 

“Who the fuck are you?” Dylan takes a step forward, giving Ryan a full head-to-toe glare, sizing him up. Olivia feels like she’s watching a movie—like she’s not involved in this situation, just watching it through a pane of glass. 

Ryan steps forward too, so they’re toe to toe. He’s taller than Dylan, but Dylan definitely has him beat in build. But Ryan doesn’t look phazed. “I’m nobody. But even I can tell that she doesn’t want to talk to you, okay? Don’t be a douche.” 

“Fine,” Dylan says, throwing his hands in the air like Ryan has a gun pointed at him or something. Olivia knows this tactic all too well. “She’s all yours dude, but you should know—she might be hot, but she doesn’t put out.” 

Before Olivia can even react to Dylan’s comment, Ryan pulls back and sucker punches Dylan right in the mouth. There’s a scuffle, Ryan and Dylan are both on the floor, and all Olivia can do is watch. She wants to ask them to stop, but her mouth is still stuck shut. The guy that was with Amber pulls Ryan away from Dylan, holds him back. A trickle of blood is running from Dylan’s nose and Ryan’s lip is split. 

“Oh, my god,” Olivia says, finally, and covers her mouth with her hands.  _ What is happening? _

Some other guy steps forward between them, gets up in Dylan’s face.  

“Get out of here, man. Nobody comes into our house and beats up one of our own.” Olivia notices about four or five guys standing in a semi-circle behind Ryan, fists clenched at their sides, ready to jump to the defense of their friend—and whoever their friend is defending apparently, which is her.  _ Oh my god, how is it her? How did she get into this? _

Dylan gapes, thumbs at the blood trickling out of his nose. “What the fuck? He—he hit me first!” He gestures toward Ryan. He sounds like a third-grader. 

The guy takes another step forward, right up in Dylan’s space now. “I don’t care, man. I said leave.” 

“Whatever,” Dylan grumbles and he turns tail. Olivia doesn’t even bother to watch him leave—as soon as he’s no longer looking at her she feels free to move again, and she rushes toward Ryan.

“ _ Ohmygod _ , I can’t—are you, are you okay?” she asks, words tumbling out in a rush.

Ryan swipes at the blood on his lip—it’s not a lot, but it’s enough—and smiles a crooked smile. “I’m fine. It was worth it.” 

“But you don’t even know me.” Olivia shakes her head. She feels like everyone in the room is looking at her, and she could not be more embarrassed. She wants to shrink, so small that no one can see her. She wants to evaporate. 

“I will,” is all he says before his friends converge around him, thumping him on the back for giving that douchebag what he deserved. Someone hands him a drink and someone else hands him a kitchen towel to wipe the blood off his face. Amber’s there then, throwing her arms around Olivia’s shoulders and apologizing in her ear over and over until Olivia assures her that it’s okay, it’s okay, but can they just  _ go _ , she needs to get out of here. 

And they go, Olivia looking over her shoulder, still wondering what Ryan was going to show her. And still wrapped up in a sweatshirt that smells like him.


	3. Chapter Three

It takes Olivia twelve seconds to walk across the bar. Ryan knows because he’s holding his breath and counting the seconds off, one at a time, the longest twelve seconds of his life, until she’s in front of him. He’s turned around on his bar stool, and she’s standing just barely outside the space between his knees, close enough now that he can see the familiar flecks of gold in her brown eyes, the way her lashes curl up away from her cheeks. It takes all his willpower not to wrap his arms around her and pull her against him. 

“Hi,” she says, bites her bottom lip, and tucks a non-existent stray hair behind her ear. Ryan resists the urge to wrap his fingers around her wrist and bring her hand to his lips and plant a kiss on it, to rest his cheek on her palm like he’s done a hundred times before. 

“Hey,” he says instead, his voice not as steady as he wants it to be.  _ Fuck. _ How is he still this affected by her? It’s been  _ six years _ . He thought he’d moved on. He also thought he’d never see her again. 

“How are you? What’re you doing here?” He can see ten more questions in her eyes.

“I’m good!” His voice is all wrong; he sounds like he’s talking to a stranger. “I just moved into town. I’m, um, I’m teaching.” 

She blinks at him. “Wow, it’s good to see you.” She’s smiling, relaxed. His heart is about to hammer its way out of his chest. He clears his throat. 

“You too. How are you?”

“I’m good. I’m…” Her gaze shifts away from his for a moment, and he’s flooded with memories of the last time he saw her, when she was definitely Not Good. But it’s just for a moment, and then she’s smiling again. “I’m really good. On a date actually, and I should probably get back, I don’t want to be rude. But.”

“Yeah, of course. I wouldn’t want to keep you.” They’re talking over each other awkwardly. They used to talk over each other all the time, but never awkwardly. 

“I do want to catch up. I mean, only if that’s okay.” The weight of her gaze takes all his words away. She could ask him anything right now and he would say yes. “I miss you.”

He inhales deep when he realizes he’s been holding his breath, waiting for her to say those exact words. 

“I miss you too. You look—”  _ Beautiful, _ he’s about to say, but he’s interrupted by a loud throat-clearing presence at Olivia’s shoulder. 

“I’m Blake,” the guy says, short and clipped. He’s pissed that his date is talking to another guy, understandably, but Ryan still goes on the defensive immediately. 

“Ryan.” His tone is just as cold. 

“Olivia, are you ready?” Blake gestures back to their table where their coats are still sitting. Ryan hates the way he says her name; it makes his stomach turn over. But he has no right to hate it.

“Yes, I’m sorry. Ryan’s just a… an old friend,” she says. Blake’s already walking back toward their table. “It was really good to see you.” Her voice rings in his ears as she walks away, each word like it was created just for him.

He forgot what this felt like—this feeling like he wants to wrap himself around a woman and never let her go. He’s been with girls since Olivia—one semi-serious relationship and one very serious one—but neither made him feel like  _ this _ : vibrating and magnetized and desperate and half crazy. 

He makes sure his tab is paid up and shrugs on his coat. Blake is helping Olivia into her coat and Ryan’s blood burns hot in his veins. He takes a deep, shaking breath and pushes his unfound anger down. He has no right to be jealous of anyone—Olivia is not his girlfriend anymore.

He steps outside, the cold January air sucking the breath from his lungs in that way only icy midwest wind can do. He flips up his collar and shoves his hands into his pockets, takes a few steps down the sidewalk toward the parking garage, but he’s purposefully moving too slow. He almost can’t help it, like there’s a tether between him and Olivia and he physically can’t get too far away. He takes a couple more steps but stops just a few feet shy of the corner when he hears her voice behind him. 

“Thank you, though, really. I had a nice time.”

“Can’t I give you a ride home?”

“No, no, I’ll be fine. I’ll call you.” 

Ryan can’t help smirking, a little self-satisfied. Obviously not a boyfriend. Obviously not serious. Obviously Ryan’s not just going to keep walking and let Olivia find her own way home. He spins on his heel, slow. He can see her silhouette in the light spilling from the front windows of the hotel, tapping the toe of one high heel against the concrete, skirt flaring out a little just above her knees. He can’t even see her face, and she’s still breathtaking. He can barely believe he’s standing on a street corner in Chicago looking at her. 

Blake disappears down the street, and she checks her phone before heading the other way. He can’t tell if she knows he’s there or not. It’s dark enough that he thinks probably not. 

“Liv,” he says, so she’ll know, and she jumps a little. 

“Ryan? Oh my god what are you doing out here?”

“Um, I don’t know. I just—” He doesn’t want to admit that he’s sort of been waiting for her. “Do you need a ride home?”

“What? No, I’ll just take the L. I’m not far from here.”

“Liv. I am not letting you take the L home by yourself at midnight. C’mon.”

“You know, Ryan, I’ve been living here a lot longer than you, by myself, and I’ve done just fine, okay.”

_ Ouch.  _

“You’re right. I’m sorry.” He reaches for her hand on instinct, slides his fingers against her palm, and he hears her breath catch. “I realize that you’re able to get home on your own, but I would love to give you a ride. We could catch up? I’d love to hear what’s been going on with you.” 

She smiles—he can’t really see her face because it’s so dark, but he can  _ feel _ her smile. It reminds him of when they would make love in the dark, how he could almost tell what she was going to do before she even did it, every movement, every sigh, every moan, so in tune with her body that he could anticipate everything. 

“I would love that, Ryan, thank you. Besides it’s fucking freezing out here.” He laughs, deep and swelling in his chest, because he didn’t even know how much he missed her until he saw her again, and now it’s like he’s found a part of himself that he didn’t even realize was missing.

They speed walk to the parking garage. In the elevator, they stand close, tension vibrating in the little space between them. There was a time when they couldn’t be in an elevator alone without being all over each other, stealing kisses, hands flying. Ryan licks his lips.

The elevator dings when they reach the third floor, and they step out together. Ryan leads the way to his black SUV, parked a couple rows over. Once they’re closed in, he turns the key and turns to look at her. 

“So where do you—” he doesn’t even get the first sentence out before she lunges across the center console and presses her mouth against his. There’s a little noise of surprise in the back of his throat, but he catches up quick, leans into it and slides his hands up to cup her cheeks. Her lips are lingering cold from being outside, but soft and gentle and... _ home _ .

When it’s clear she’s not going to pull away, he tugs her toward him and she stumble-falls into his lap. She’s wedged between the steering wheel and his chest, pressed tight up against him, with her legs draped sideways over the center console. Her hands are in his hair, gripping tight the way she knows he likes, and Ryan’s chest aches with the familiarity of it. 

She sighs into his mouth and he swallows it down gratefully. He could eat her sighs for the rest of his life and be completely satisfied. She pulls back just a little—as much as she can with the steering wheel boxing her in—licks her lips and takes a breath. Her hands are still cupping the back of his head. The windows are foggy.

“I really miss you, Ryan,” she breathes, each word better than the last. He dimples at her, searches her eyes for confirmation.

“What about Blake?”

“Blake’s not for me. That was our second date, and I knew at the start of it that it would be our last.” He let’s that drop for a second, let’s the full weight of it sink into him—she’s single and he’s single and they’re living in the same city again. 

“Okay, then.” He smiles and then pulls her into him again. Her lips are warm now and soft against his, and he coaxes her mouth open, slides his tongue against hers, and the sensation goes straight through him. She gasps lightly against his lips, and he knows she feels it too. He slides a hand up her thigh, the callouses on his palm catching slightly on her nylon tights as he makes his way under her skirt, his fingers wrapping around her hip and pressing, pulling her closer. He can’t get her close enough, he wants to envelop her within himself so she can’t ever leave him again. 

He gently breaks away from her lips, and she tilts her head back into where his hand is tangled in her hair. He drags his lips down to her neck to her pulse point, where he can feel her heart pumping warm and fast under her skin. His lips are no longer kissing, but just lingering there as he breathes in her perfume—it’s different than she used to wear, but he likes it. He wants more, so he nudges his nose up behind her ear, licking at her earlobe as he goes, right up into the base of her hairline. She shivers against him, her hands tightening in his hair, as he adjusts his hand in her skirt, feeling his way along this new but familiar territory. 

“Ryan,” she whispers just as his fingers are skidding around the edge of her panties. He pauses, breathing hard, praying she’s not going to ask him to stop. He’s rock hard inside his stiff new suit pants, wanting her so bad he can hardly see straight. “Do you still keep condoms in your glovebox?” 

He can feel her smile against his cheek, and he swallows his sigh of relief, pulls away and smiles back. He doesn’t even have to say yes; she’s leaning over and twisting her wrist around so she can pop the glove box open. He helps her find a condom, under the owner’s manual and behind the tire gauge. She plucks it from his fingers, but doesn’t tear into it yet. She smiles, raises an eyebrow.

“Meet me in the backseat?” 

“Hell yes.” He’s already unbuttoning his pants. Olivia slides between the seats and into the back as Ryan shoves his pants and boxers off. He doesn’t bother with his shirt. 

When he turns around to climb into the backseat, Olivia’s shimmying out of her tights and panties, skirt already bunched up around her waist. Ryan can’t see much in the dim yellow glow from the garage lights through the hazy windows, but he can see just enough. He groans as he makes his way towards her, shoulders his way between her knees. She scoots back to make room for him, so she’s half-sitting against the door, hands braced against the seat just behind her. Ryan dips his head between her legs, just to taste her, and  _ god  _ she is perfect under his tongue—wet and soft and trembling. He works his way closer, tries to get into a more comfortable position because he wants to take his time, he wants to remind her of how good it can be with him, remind her that he knows her, every part of her. 

He ends up with one knee in the back passenger side footwell and the other up on the seat. He wraps his arms under her thighs, lays one forearm over her hips to hold her still and slides his other hand into hers. The moan that escapes her lips when his tongue touches her is worth every moment he’s been without her for the past six years. 

He works her over with his tongue until she’s arching her back, pressing up into his mouth, one hand gripping the back of his head. 

“Ryan, oh my  _ god _ ,” she moans, and he feels her stop breathing for a moment, while she balances on the edge, and then all at once she’s falling over, shaking under him, her thighs clamping shut around his ears, and he doesn’t pull back until she’s pulling at his hair urgently and repeating his name, breathy and high and desperate. 

He crawls up her body until he’s hovering over her. Her eyes are still closed and a light sheen of sweat shines on her forehead. He kisses her full on the mouth, and she clutches his shirt in her fists, still catching her breath. After a moment, she finally opens her eyes, and he pulls away, smiling. 

“How—how was that?” he asks. He sounds more nervous than he feels. 

“Even better than I remembered.” She smiles back, shifts a little, and then she’s holding the condom between them and tearing it open. She  _ finally _ slides her hand around him, and he  _ aches _ , moaning and pushing forward into her hand. He drops his head to her shoulder, drags his teeth along her collarbone, right where three small blackbirds are tattooed onto her skin—the result of a drunken decision her freshman year of college. He can’t see it in the dark, but he knows every inch of her.  

“Liv,” he says, laced with desperation. She rolls the condom onto him and he pushes in slowly, groaning.

The hot drag of her against him is everything, and he loses himself in her—in the puff of her breath against his neck, every tiny sound she makes, her little hands clutching at the back of his shirt, balling it in her fists like it’s tethering her to earth. His thrusts become faster and harder, pumping from his thighs the best he can in the cramped space, and he’s about to lose it but he wants her to come again, wants to feel that clench around his dick so bad he’s almost wild with it. He wriggles a hand between their bodies, so tight together that it’s actually difficult for him to get his hand there, and presses two fingers against her and rubs two, three, four circles, and she cries out, shaking hard underneath him. His rhythm falters as he gets closer and closer, and he’s barely thrusting now but just rocking against her, hot and heavy and  _ so close _ , and then she clenches around him in aftershock and he loses it with a shout of his own, squeezes his eyes shut so tight he sees stars. It’s so good he actually laughs between each huge heave of breath.

He pulls out slowly, tenderly, so he doesn’t hurt her, removes the condom and rolls down the window so he can throw it outside.

“That’s disgusting,” Olivia says, but she’s smiling. She’s wiggling her skirt back down over her ass. She doesn’t even bother with her tights or panties—they’re still lying under the driver’s seat. Ryan hopes she leaves them there. She would probably think that was disgusting too. He just shrugs and smirks at her. 

They crawl back into the front seat, Ryan leading the way and Olivia still giggling, and once they’re both seated, he turns to her. He can’t believe he just had sex with  _ Olivia _ in the back of his car. He inhales—he’s about to ask her where she lives—what he was in the middle of asking when she kissed him—so he can take her home. Like a gentleman would. The words are almost out of his mouth, but— 

“Liv, come back to my place.”

He’s not a gentleman. Obviously. She looks at him, steady, her eyes unreadable. He’s worried he crossed a line, but fuck it, he’s pretty sure they’ve already crossed every line. 

Finally, she takes a breath. 

“Okay.”


	4. Chapter Four (Before)

It’s late. Or early, depending on which side of it you are. Regardless, Olivia is bleary, one of the few students left in the library, surrounded by history notes and empty paper latte cups. Her last final of her college career is in six hours, and she’s pulling her last all-nighter ever. She’s determined to ace this final, to go out with a bang, but she’s losing steam fast. 

She turns the page of her notebook, trying fruitlessly to memorize the names of the most influential paintings of the pre-Renaissance era, and takes a sip of a cold latte. 

“Is that my sweatshirt?” 

She startles—has to clap a hand over her mouth to keep from screaming when she feels his breath on her ear. Ryan laughs and slides into the seat next to her. 

“You scared the shit out of me. Thanks for that.” 

“You’re welcome.” He leans forward, pretending to inspect what she’s wearing, even though he knows damn well it’s his sweatshirt. “That  _ is _ my sweatshirt.” He’s grinning like an idiot, dimples little craters in his cheeks. 

“What?” she says, defensive. “It’s comfortable. It’s cold in here.” She pulls the sleeves down over her hands and crosses her arms in front of her chest.

He clicks his tongue in a mock  _ tsk  _ sound. “Excuses, excuses.” 

“I was going to give it back.” 

“I don’t want it back. It looks better on you.” 

Olivia looks down, her cheeks hot.

“It does.” Ryan smiles, nudges her shoulder with his. “Do you mind if I join you?” 

“Be my guest.” She leans forward to move some of her books and papers out of his way so he can have a space for his. 

“No, don’t bother. I’m not studying.” He pulls a book out of his back pocket and opens it at a dog-eared page. 

“Jealous,” Olivia sighs. “Are you done with finals?”

“Took my last one this afternoon, thank god.”

“Then what are you doing in the library?”

“Looking for you.” He peeks at her over the top edge of his book, the fluorescent lights reflecting in the swimming bluegreen of his eyes. Olivia reminds herself to breath. There’s a fizzy warmth picking its way up her spine.

“Why?” 

“What do you mean,  _ why _ ? I like you. I want to be around you.” 

“You don’t even know me.” 

“I know you’re an artist,” he says, glancing down at the sketches in the margins of her notes—she’s been really into drawing profiles lately, doodling her classmates instead of taking notes, which has made it a bit difficult trying to piece together information for her finals. A rosy flush creeps back into her cheeks. She doesn’t know what to say, but he keeps going. “I know you don’t like parties. I know you’re a good friend.” He pauses, a soft smile on his lips, like he can’t decide if he wants to say what he’s about to say next. “I know you look adorable when you blush.” 

She shifts in her seat. “But...but we’re about to graduate. We don’t even know where we’ll be in a month.”

“Why are you trying to talk me out of this?”

“Because,” her voice cracks a little, and she winces, “because…” She can’t bring herself to say it out loud. 

Ryan puts down his book and turns his body toward her, so he’s facing her fully. “Look, I… I really like you. And I  _ want _ to get to know you. But I’ll back off if you don’t like me, okay. Just say so, and I’ll get lost.” 

Olivia pauses, her heart feeling a little bit too big for her chest. He’s looking at her so sincerely, she’s a little taken aback, and a little emotional. She blinks a few times. “No, it’s not that I don’t like you, I just—”

“Give me a chance?” he asks. He braces a hand on the back of her chair. He looks so cute and hopeful, Olivia doesn’t even know what to say. She wants to say  _ yes _ , but she’s still not sure. Ryan takes her silence as a sign of hope, and he leans forward a little, brushes her hair behind her ear. “I won’t break your heart, I promise,” he says, his voice a low rumble. 

“How do you know?” she whispers. She didn’t mean to say it; she meant to say  _ okay _ or  _ fine _ or something that wouldn’t cut her open and put her on display, for him to see right down inside to the most vulnerable part of her. 

In the pause, in the milliseconds that tick by, she wildly wishes he would kiss her—anything to break the tension between them—and she suddenly can’t stop looking at his lips—just the tiniest bit parted, the pink of his tongue pressed behind his perfectly straight row of bottom teeth. The pause hangs heavy between them and time slows to a trickle. He takes a slow breath—she’s holding hers—and then he does kiss her, his palm against her cheek. The soft press of his lips sucks the breath right out of her lungs. It only lasts a second, but she’ll dream about it for a lifetime. He looks her square in the eye.

“Because I can tell that he broke your heart, and I can’t bear to see that happen to you again.” 

It’s the cheesiest line ever, but it’s good enough for her. She never said she didn’t appreciate a cheesy line every once in awhile. She doesn’t have to respond, she just leans in and reconnects their lips. Ryan holds her face in both his hands and coaxes her mouth open with his. It’s languid and soft, like they’ve got all the time in the world, like he’d be perfectly content to just sit here and kiss her all night. Olivia doesn’t think she’s ever been kissed like this before—a comfortable kiss, a kiss without any expectation behind it—but she likes it. A lot.

Ryan slides one hand down along the curve where her neck meets her shoulder and presses his fingers light into her shoulder blade, pulling her closer to him, at sort of an awkward angle. She opens her mouth wider, realizes vaguely that her hands are still sitting in her lap and she reaches her fingers up into the hair at the back of his neck. She can tell he hasn’t shaved in a few days because his chin is rough against hers.

They kiss and kiss, all hands and sighs and knees knocking into each other. They kiss until Olivia tries to shift herself forward and she pushes a book off the table with her elbow. The sound of it hitting the floor makes her jump and she pulls away. Her lips feel instantly cold without Ryan’s on them.

“Ryan, I—I...” she stammers. Her voice is weirdly hoarse. 

“I’m sorry,” he says, pushing both his hands through his hair, and her stomach lurches a little.

“It’s okay, I—I just. I really do need to study.” She pushes the button on her phone so she can see the time—it’s 2:36. Her Art History II final is in five and a half hours. She’s probably not going to sleep tonight at all. “I’m sorry,” she says, and she  _ really _ is. She would so much rather spend the night kissing Ryan than memorizing the names and birthdates of Renaissance painters. 

“Don’t be sorry.” Ryan’s smile is so easy and contagious. He somehow looks proud and humble at the same time, but mostly just happy, content. Like there’s nowhere else he would rather be than right here next to her in the library in the middle of the night. “Can I keep you company while you study?” 

“Sure,” Olivia says. “I’m sorry I won’t be much fun.” 

“If you need me to quiz you, let me know.” He winks and her stomach does a flip flop. She looks back down at her notes and sighs. 

She studies. And Ryan reads. And he quizzes her on the different eras and the names and birthdates of Renaissance painters. 

Around 4:00, Olivia is so tired that she can barely keep her eyes open. She sets her forehead on top of her notes and groans. 

“I think if I don’t know it by now, I’m not going to know it for the test,” she mumbles into her papers.

Ryan’s hand is on her back, rubbing circles between her shoulder blades. “Want me to walk you home?” 

She nods and starts to gather her stuff, shoving loose pages of notes roughly into notebooks and folders and stuffing it all hastily into her bag. There are still a few lights on in study rooms as they walk through the stacks, but mostly it’s quiet—just the occasional sound of pages turning, people sniffing, the whir of the air conditioning. 

When they step outside, the air is chilly, and Olivia pulls Ryan’s sweatshirt sleeves down over her hands again. They walk in silence mostly, but it’s comfortable. Olivia usually feels awkward in the face of silence, like she has to fill it, but with Ryan it’s different. She’ doesn’t believe in love at first sight, but  _ something _ is happening low in her belly and between her ribs and out to her fingertips.

Ryan walks her all the way to the door of her apartment, and he’s still smiling when she turns to him at her front door, the yellow glow from the porch light casting shadows across his angular face. He’s always smiling, and she loves that about him. He’s like sunshine incarnate. 

“Hey, there’s another party at my house the night of graduation. I know you’re not a party person, but … please come?” 

“I will,” Olivia says immediately. She hates parties, but she likes Ryan. “You know…” she pauses, then decides to just go for it. “I’m still curious about what you were going to show me before Dylan showed up and ruined everything last weekend.” 

“I’ll show you on Saturday. I’ve been saving that bottle of whiskey.” He leans in, his hand touching the small of her back, light but still holding her close to him, and kisses her lips, soft and lingering. 

“I’ll see you Saturday?” he says as he pulls away. 

“Yes.” She can’t manage more than a whisper. Her knees are jello. 

She goes to bed still tasting Ryan on her lips, and she wakes up in three hours and aces that final. 


	5. Chapter Five

Ryan wakes up slowly—blinking and bleary-eyed. The air in his apartment is chilly against his bare skin and he’s covered in goosebumps. His head is throbbing, and he can’t quite remember where he is or why. He props up onto his elbows, the bed shifts next to him and it all comes flooding back like some kind of movie montage—seeing her across the bar, knocking back whiskey shots to try to forget her, eating her out in the backseat of his car, multiple glasses of wine back at his apartment, fucking so hard it pulled the fitted sheet off the corner of the mattress. In his sleepy, sort-of hungover haze, that fact takes a few seconds to really hit him. It comes at him just one word at a time:  _ Olivia. Is. In. His. Bed _ . 

He slowly turns his head to the right. She’s on her side, facing him, her breathing deep and rhythmic, her hair a frizzy blonde halo around her head. Every feeling he ever had for her is right at the surface, shimmering under his skin and behind his eyes and in his throat. He thought he got over her. He tried  _ so fucking hard _ to get over her. Fuck, he almost asked Emily to marry him, and now he barely even thinks about her. He doesn’t wonder how she’s doing or where she is; he doesn’t ever miss her. But he always missed Olivia, deep down in the most secret back hidden part of him, he always missed her, longed for her. She was his best friend, and after... 

His stomach twists and he doesn’t think it’s the hangover. He remembers the end like it happened yesterday—the pleading, the hollow look in Olivia’s eyes, the drinking, the empty sex, the feeling of complete abandonment when she walked away from it all like it didn’t even matter. 

He scrubs a  calloused hand down over his face, thick with stubble. His mouth tastes like an ashtray. He drags himself out of bed and looks around for his pants, finally finds them over by the door and pulls them on over his bare ass. Next he finds his phone, on the far edge of the kitchen counter— _ how did it get there? _ —and checks the time: 5:54am. His first class is an 8:00am, though he should probably get to his office by 7:30 at least, which means he has to leave in an hour. He looks over at Olivia in his rumpled bed.  _ Shit _ . She looks so peaceful curled around one of his pillows, the blanket fallen down around her ribs now, exposing one of her breasts.

He wants to stay, wishes he could cancel all his classes today and spend the day in bed with Olivia instead. They could order pizza or cheap chinese food and watch old movies or trashy TV, just like they used to. Olivia used to love when they found a marathon of reality TV, and she’d make Ryan watch it with her all day. He didn’t really mind that much, to be honest, as long as he got to be within three feet of her. 

But it’s the second day of the semester—the first day of his Tuesday/Thursday group of classes. He could come home between his 8:00am class and his 2:00pm class. Maybe if he let his 8:00am out a little early he could even be back before Olivia wakes up. 

He’s still got stacks of unpacked boxes lined up against one wall, one near the top sloppily marked  _ underwear _ , and he tears it open, grabs a pair of boxers, and heads to the shower. 

He pokes silently around his apartment while Olivia sleeps, doesn’t even make a pot of coffee because he’s afraid it’ll wake her up. There’s a coffee shop just down the street, he’ll stop on his way and get breakfast. He wishes he had time to leave breakfast for Olivia, considering he hasn’t been grocery shopping yet and his fridge is literally empty. He checks the time again—7:05. He has to go. He scrawls a note for her on the back of a take out menu— _ Please stay. I should be home by 10. Lunch? _ —and leaves it on the table by the bed. And he sneaks out the door. 

All through his first class, his heart is pounding. He can barely concentrate on the syllabus that he’s trying to explain to the bored students sitting in front of him. The first day is always a bit rough, but he can’t focus at all. He rushes through the structure of the class, the major assignments, what they need to read for next week, and then he dismisses. It’s only 8:40. He packs his papers into his bag as quickly as he can. He just has to swing by his office and then he can be on his way. He hopes she’ll still be there. 

He thinks about her the whole walk back to his office. She’s in everything he sees and touches. The sky, the trees, the snow, the door, the elevator. Especially the elevator. He’s probably grinning as he walks into his office, but he doesn’t care. The grin falls immediately when the head of the department is sitting in front of his desk, however. 

“Dr. Borders. How are you?” 

“Mr. Daniels,” Dr. Borders says, clipped, and Ryan winces a bit. After all the time he spent in school, he really should be  _ Doctor _ Daniels. Dr. Borders stands and looks up at Ryan. Borders is a short, southern man, head bald and shiny, always on time and always walking ridiculously fast. He’s wearing his coat and Ryan notices his briefcase sitting on the floor by his feet. It’s still not clicking. “Ready for our brunch meeting?”

Ryan’s stomach sinks all the way to the floor. He completely forgot about this meeting. He can’t miss it; it’s his  _ second day _ on the job. 

“Oh, yes—yessir. Just let me, um… I just have to grab a few things here.” 

Dr. Borders nods once. “I’ll meet you in the lobby.” 

As soon as he’s out the door, Ryan pulls his phone out of his pocket, with the intent to text Olivia and apologize profusely. Offer to take her to dinner tonight to make up for it. Make definite plans to see her again. And he’s already got the messaging app open on his phone when he realizes, like a punch to the gut, that he doesn’t have her number. 

When she left, six years ago, without warning, without saying goodbye, without fucking anything, Ryan tried to call her; it seemed like a hundred times. He worked himself up, worried she was missing, that she’d been mugged, kidnapped, raped,  _ worse _ , but something deep in his gut told him to hold out on calling the police. Deep in his gut he knew—he knew she’d just  _ left _ . Left of her own accord. Let  _ him _ of her own accord. God that hurt like a bitch, but he knew. He called her over and over, leaving her message after message, didn’t care if he was being desperate, clingy, insane, pushing her even further away.  _ How did this even happen? _ Finally he laid down in bed,  _ their bed _ — _ she should be beside him not miles away where was she? _ He wanted to cry, but he wouldn’t let himself. Instead, he closed his eyes against it, forced back the hot, threatening tears, and fell asleep, phone still clutched in his hand. When he woke up the next morning, he had a text from her—he’d slept so hard he hadn’t even woken at the notification—a short, simple text.  _ I’m fine. I’m sorry. _

And he was so  _ angry _ . Angry that she’d just  _ left _ without any explanation, without saying goodbye, without even giving him a choice or a chance to convince her to stay, without ever taking his feelings into account. Angry that their relationship hadn’t meant as much to her as it had to him. Angry that he was embarrassed by that fact. Angry at himself for not being able to keep her—he hadn’t loved her enough, he hadn’t been enough for her to stay. His body shook with the rage coursing through him, and while he wanted to crack his phone in half with his bare hands, he settled for deleting her number from his phone, punching the screen angrily. And in a minute, it was all gone—every message they’d sent over the past four months, every voicemail she’d ever left him. He knew he’d have to delete the pictures—his entire photo gallery—too, but he’d deal with that later. And he rolled over and went back to sleep, stayed in bed for days after that.

That was the last time he’d called Olivia. 

Now his fingers hover over the screen of his phone, his heart twisting inside his chest. He was so angry, so  _ hurt _ , after she’d left, and this morning he was about to buy her breakfast, cancel his classes and stay in bed with her for the rest of the day, just because he happened to bump into her once? Like he thought they could just fall right back into the way they used to be like nothing had ever happened, without talking about any of it. Yeah, maybe he’d never really gotten over Olivia, but he wasn’t about to set himself up for being walked away from again. He couldn’t take that again.

He doesn’t have her number; there’s nothing he can do about this situation he’s in right now. He wishes he’d never written that note this morning, but she’ll get over it. He has to go—this meeting is important. He drops off some of his paperwork, lightening up his bag a little, makes sure he has his wallet, and then heads out the door. 


	6. Chapter Six (Before)

“Where the hell are  _ you _ going?” Amber looks up from applying mascara at the bathroom mirror. Olivia tried to walk past nonchalantly, so Amber wouldn’t call her out, but obviously that didn’t work out very well.  

“Um,” Olivia says. 

“You’re going to that party, aren’t you?”

“Maybe?” She shrugs, puts on her best expression of innocence. 

“Why didn’t you tell me? Wait just a minute and I’ll walk down with you.” 

It feels like a repeat of the other night, except for this time Amber doesn’t make her change into some skimpy outfit. 

“You look great,” Amber comments, and Olivia glances down at her skinny jeans and pointy heels. She has on a new tank top that’s open at the back, which she feels pretty confident about, and she doesn’t plan on wearing a jacket. 

“Thank you. So do you,” she replies. Amber has on a tight leopard-print skirt, strappy sandals laced halfway up her calves, and a snug white v-neck. 

They walk down the sidewalk, shoulder to shoulder. Olivia feels a tinge of sadness creep in among all the butterflies in her stomach that are for Ryan. She and Amber have lived together for the past two years, and now they’re graduated. Olivia’s living out their lease until the end of August, but Amber’s moving out in a week—she got a job in San Diego of all places, across the freaking world. They’ve talked about visiting, flying back and forth, skyping often, but they don’t have any definite plans because they’re both broke. Amber’s been her best friend for almost three years. Olivia doesn’t know how she’s gonna do life without seeing Amber everyday. 

Olivia bumps Amber’s shoulder with hers and Amber bumps back. 

“You really like him, huh? That guy...what’s his name? The one that punched Dylan for you.”

“Ryan.” Olivia can’t keep the note of excitement out of her voice. 

“Yeah, Ryan. Been asking me about you constantly for like the last month.” They stop a few feet shy of the driveway of the boys’ house, and Amber turns to look at her. “He really likes you.”

“He kissed me in the library,” Olivia blurts. She can’t keep the smile off her face. She’s not really used to this. 

“What!” Amber exclaims, throwing her arms around Olivia with a squeal. “I asked Steve if he was a good guy or if he was just trying to get in your pants, and Steve said he’s a really good guy. They’ve lived together for a couple years at least, I think, so I’d trust him.” 

“I think he is a good guy,” Olivia says. 

“Just don’t do anything I wouldn’t do.”

Olivia laughs at that—there’s not a lot that Amber wouldn’t do. 

“I won’t if you won’t.”

“Promise.” 

“Promise.” 

They walk inside together, but Amber goes off in search of Steve almost immediately. Olivia scans the room for Ryan and, when she doesn’t see him right away, goes from the living room, through the kitchen, and into the hallway where his bedroom is. The door is closed, and her stomach sinks to her knees. He has to be here somewhere. He wouldn’t just invite her and then not be here. Besides, he lives here. He has to be here. Olivia wipes her palms on her jeans and adjusts her tank top, runs a hand through her hair. She’s just decided to try the backyard when hands cover her eyes from behind and she jumps about a foot in the air. 

“Hey,” a low voice rumbles in her ear, and her stomach lurches, heart threatening to leap right out of her chest. 

“Hi,” she squeaks, turning around so she’s encircled by him, caught in close by his arms around her shoulders. He smells like musky cologne and booze.

“I was worried you wouldn’t come,” he says, words slurring just a little. She probably wouldn’t even have noticed if she hadn’t been so close. He’s looking at her lips, and her heart pounds. 

“I told you I would.” 

“I thought you’d change your mind.” 

“I wanted to see you,” she admits, and his cheeks turn pink, just a little. 

“Still rather have whiskey than beer?” he asks. She nods, and he drops his arms to her waist, briefly, and then to his sides. He pulls his room key from the front pocket of a pair of baggy jeans and turns to open the door. She leans into the doorway as he goes in, poking her head around the frame. His bed is made, but a little rumpled, like he pulled the blankets up in a hurry. An open cardboard box on the floor is half-full of books, with even more stacked on the desk. There’s an empty suitcase on the floor. 

“Are you moving?” she says, a tiny twinge in her chest. A week ago he said he didn’t have any post-graduation plans, but maybe he got a job. Or maybe he was moving home. She didn’t even know where home was for him. 

“What?” He turns and notices her looking at his half-packed mess in the corner. “Oh! Yeah, to an apartment over on 6th.” 

Olivia lets out a breath she didn’t realize she was holding. That’s only a couple blocks away.  _ Wait a minute. _

“I live on 6th!” 

“No way! In Bierman Place?”

“Yes! Oh my god, how weird.” She giggles nervously. She didn’t want him to move away, but now he’s going to be living in the same building as her, and she doesn’t quite know how to feel. 

“Yeah, I got a summer TA position for Dr. Joffrey, but our lease on this place is up and the rest of the guys are moving out. I can’t afford to live here by myself, and that was the only apartment I could find that had anything available and wasn’t a ten mile walk to campus everyday.”

“Bierman’s not so bad. It’s a little noisy on the weekends, but you’ll like it.” 

He quirks an eyebrow at her and steps forward, so they’re almost toe to toe. “I’ll like it even more if I get to run into you every now and again.” His voice is low, his breath fluttering her hair. He smells nothing like beer tonight. “Want to see the reason I moved into this house?”

Her voice has betrayed her, so she just nods. 

He turns back to his dresser drawer, retrieving a bottle of whiskey. She can’t help but notice the way his shirt stretches across his broad shoulders and hangs off his frame, ending just above his narrow hips. He straightens up a few seconds later with the bottle of whiskey and two red solo cups stacked together, and she blinks and looks away, pretending she wasn’t just staring at him. 

He gives her a knowing smile. “C’mon,” he says, jerking his head toward the door.

He leads her back out to the living room, back past the front door, and up the stairs on the other side of the house. This must be where all his roommate’s rooms are, Olivia thinks as they go down the second floor hallway, lined with closed doors. There are some very distinct moans and grunts coming from behind a few of them. Olivia clenches her thighs together as they walk. At the end of the hall, Ryan pulls open a door that reveals a staircase, long and narrow, and Olivia realizes that they’re going up to the roof. 

She follows Ryan in silence as they walk up the stairs and through the attic. Ryan pushes open a window and steps through it, feet slipping a little on the shingles as he makes his way outside. Olivia’s heart is in her throat—she’s not a huge fan of heights—but she’s not about to lose this. So she kicks off her shoes and follows him out. The shingles are rough against her bare feet as she grips with her toes, and she’s not sure she can move. Ryan’s holding his hand out to her, so she slides her fingers into his. He grips tight, patient, and waits for her to take a step. 

“It’s okay,” he says. “I won’t let you fall.” 

She tries to smile, but it’s wobbly, and he squeezes her fingers. She takes a tentative step, then one more. Deep breath. Ryan maneuvers into a seated position and then tugs her into his lap. She slides down between his knees, her back tight against his chest and her knees drawn up, and he wraps the blanket around them both. The blanket smells like him—like musky cologne and fresh deodorant and squeaky clean laundry detergent—and she takes a deep breath as she settles back against his chest, into his arms. Finally she looks up, and the view is beautiful—the lights of downtown Minneapolis sparkling off the still water of Lake Superior. 

“Wow,” she says. 

Ryan manages to pour a couple inches of whiskey into a cup and hands it to her. It doesn’t escape her that he nearly fills his own cup. 

“To new beginnings,” he says, bumping his cup into hers, a little too enthusiastically. Whiskey sloshes over the side and all over Olivia’s hand. 

“Whoa,” she says at the exact time he says, “Sorry sorry!” She feels his laugh rumble through his chest. Olivia says, “Don’t waste it!” and licks the sticky alcohol from her fingers—and as she does, Ryan’s eyes flash dark. He tips his cup up, gulping whiskey—Olivia watches his adam’s apple bob as he swallows and it’s weirdly arousing—and then puts down his cup. He wraps his arms around her and leans forward, almost resting his chin on her shoulder so that when she turns her head his nose only inches from hers. 

“Do that again,” he whispers, husky. 

When she asks, “what?” he reaches down for her hand and brings it to her lips. “Do that again.” 

She hesitantly pokes out her tongue and runs it up the seam between her pointer and middle fingers. She can practically feel Ryan shudder around her, and she turns into it. 

His kiss is all soft lips and hot breath, his hands touching her everywhere. He pulls her closer, right up against himself, his body heat leaching into her, keeping her warm. His fingers slip up under the hem of her shirt, his thumb tracing invisible patterns on the small of her back, causing prickling goosebumps to creep up her spine. 

“Is this okay?” he whispers against her lips, and something about it blooms hot and heavy between her legs. She nods and god she  _ wants _ him. So bad it feels like it’s going to claw its way out of her, right through muscle and tendon and skin, and burst into the night air all of its own accord. 

“Ryan,” Olivia mumbles against his lips. When he pulls away, her lips sting a little from his stubble.

“Yeah?” he mumbles, dropping his forehead against hers. He’s breathing hard. 

“I really think I’d like to see your bedroom again,” she says, a little shy. She’s shivering a little in the cold without Ryan pressed tight against her. The blanket they had pulled around themselves is half crooked now, only over one of her shoulders, and her shirt is hiked up to her breasts, the chill air sharp against her bare skin. 

“Hell fucking  _ yes _ ,” Ryan says, and he’s up in an instant, tugging Olivia to her feet by the hands and pulling her towards the window. She barely notices the height now, only looking at Ryan’s shoulders shifting under his shirt, his hand wrapped around hers. 

He helps her through the window and keeps her hand in his all the way back down the stairs, through the crush of the crowd in the living room, and into his bedroom, where he shuts and locks the door behind her. It isn’t until then that he turns to look at her. 

He takes both her hands, just by the tips of her fingers, and pulls her between his knees as he drops to the edge of the bed. She smiles down at him, not used to seeing him at this angle since he’s always above her. His hair is thick and shiny, pushed up in the back where she had her hands in it.

“C’mere,” he says, rough, and tugs on her hands. She climbs into his lap, a knee on the bed on either side of his narrow hips. His hands are up under her shirt, hot against her skin. He presses his forehead against her shoulder, and she rests her chin on top of his ruffled hair and breathes him in. She can hear the noise of the party outside his bedroom door, can feel the thumping bass beat of the music between her ribs, but the world could be falling down around her, it could be the apocalypse outside this room, and she wouldn’t be able to move from this spot.

“Ryan,” she whispers.

“Mmm?” he groans. 

She leans back a bit so she can look at him as she whispers, “I want to—” Her hands are in fists against her thighs. 

“I’d bet you a million dollars that I want to more,” he says, so soft she almost doesn’t hear him, before planting his palms against her back and twisting around, tipping her back onto his comforter. He kisses her, harder and more demanding than any of his kisses have been so far, not lingering on her lips but over her ear, down her jawline to her collarbone. His fingers find the button of her jeans and flick it open, slide down the zipper. She lifts her hips off the bed so he can shimmy her jeans over her ass, push them down and off the edge of the bed. He runs his hands up her thighs, slow, savoring, and leans in to kiss her stomach at the edge of her panties. She’s thanking her lucky stars that she wore a pair of pink lace panties tonight, even though she wasn’t  _ quite _ expecting this to happen. She shivers as his lips touch her, half on her skin and half on lace, and then travel down, right to where she’s the hottest and wettest. His breath ghosts over her, and she squirms under him. She’s never wanted anything so badly in her life. 

He leans back, and though she’s screaming internally, she doesn’t make a sound as he pulls her legs apart and bends her knees so her feet are up on the bed, so she’s wide open and angled toward him, ready. She’s nervous suddenly—no one she’s ever been with before did this, never  _ wanted  _ to do this, and Olivia was always too afraid or too ashamed to ask—but she just breathes through it. Breathes and breathes as Ryan lowers his mouth over her, over her panties, and licks at her, breathes her in, and she shudders under him. 

She grips the blanket. “Oh my  _ god _ .” 

Ryan hums against her, and she’s squirming again. 

“Ryan,” she says, begging, and he hooks a finger under the elastic edge of her panties, right in the corner of her thigh, and pulls them to the side, follows with his tongue, licking straight over her clit and down. He reaches up, fingers dancing along her stomach under her shirt, fire against her skin, and under her bra, to find her nipple, and he’s still licking and lapping, tortuous with his tongue. And just when she’s on the verge, he stops short, lets her panties snap back into place, and she’s aching and squirming and confused. 

Until he’s stripping off his jeans and boxers and her shirt and his shirt and diving under his bed for a condom and then he’s on top of her, inside of her, pulling sounds and sensations out of her that she never even knew existed until this moment. 

After, she curls into Ryan on instinct, and he wraps an arm around her and pulls the sheet and blanket over them both. She vaguely hopes that Amber’s not worried about her before she slips into sleep.


	7. Chapter Seven

The next time he sees her is in the coffee shop just down the street from his apartment. It’s been a week—ten days actually—since he left her sleeping in his apartment. She was gone when he finally got back that night. She didn’t leave a note or her phone number or anything. And he didn’t have anyway to get in touch with her, except for maybe Facebook, but that just seemed so tacky, even for him. So he just… didn’t. But that didn’t mean he stopped thinking about her. She was in his head 24/7—while he was teaching and when he worked out, while he ate dinner and brushed his teeth and while he showered.

This time she’s the one that sees him first. He’s just shaking the snow out of his hair, his hands aching from the sudden warmth inside the shop, when he hears his name. “Ryan!” her voice laced with surprise. He looks up, and she’s standing right in front of him, holding a coffee and a paper bag. Her blonde hair is piled high on top of her head and her cheeks are pink—Ryan can’t tell if it’s from embarrassment or from the blast of cold air that followed him in the door.

“L-liv! Olivia, hi!” he stutters out, shoving his hands into his pockets. He steps out of the way of the door. It’s Saturday morning and the shop is crazy crowded, every table taken, the line nearly reaching the door. He wedges himself back next to the window, nearly in the lap of some guy that’s on his laptop, sipping some kind of fancy coffee out of a tiny mug.

“It’s good to see you—” Olivia starts just as Ryan says, “I was going to call, but—”

They stop talking at the same time, laughing a little. Olivia looks down and bites her lip, and he feels terrible. She’s trying to play it off, but she forgets how well he knows her; he knows when she’s sad, when she’s hurt, and when she’s trying to cover it up.

“Liv, I’m sorry, I—” he clears his throat. “I didn’t mean to—to leave you there. I- I forgot I had a meeting with my boss and I didn’t have your number. I don’t know, I just—I wanted to come back I really did, I swear I wasn’t trying to stand you up—” He’s aware that he should shut up, but he can’t.

“Ryan,” Olivia says, kind of loudly. His mouth snaps shut and he looks up at her. The hurt’s still in her eyes, but he doesn’t think it’s from him anymore. “Ryan, it’s okay. You don’t owe me anything.” Her voice is wavering a bit and he feels like he’s being flayed.

He reaches forward on instinct, grabs her wrist. She’s wearing mittens. He wishes he could feel her skin against his.

“I really am sorry,” he says.

“You don’t have to be.” She smiles softly, a kind but sad sort of smile. Ryan’s heart cracks a little.

“What, um, what are you doing today?”

“Oh.” She looks surprised he asked. “I’m just going to, uh.” She sighs. “You know what, I was just going to go back to my apartment and become one with my couch for the rest of the day. The only reason I even came out in the first place is because I didn’t have any coffee left at my place.” She holds up a bag of ground coffee along with her pastry bag and grimaces, self-deprecating, but she doesn’t ever need to be embarrassed around him.  

“Do you wanna… do you wanna sit for a minute? We didn’t really, uh, _talk_ much the other night.” Ryan’s pretty sure he’s blushing now, _fuck_. Just thinking about the other night is making his dick chub up a little. He changes his weight from one foot to the other, presses his hands further down into the pockets of his coat.

Olivia’s cheeks turn a little pinker too. “That’d be great,” she says, so softly that he can barely hear her over all the noise in the shop. He scans the room quick, catches a table in the back corner. “Wanna go grab that table?” He nods his chin toward it. “I’ll just jump in line real quick.”

She nods and heads back to the back of the room to claim their spot. Ryan orders coffee and a doughnut, taps his foot waiting for it, anxious for some reason, like he’s afraid if it takes too long Olivia’s going to change her mind and leave. He glances back to the table where she’s sitting. She’s looking at her phone, deeply absorbed in whatever she’s reading. A few stray strands of hair have fallen out of her bun and in front of her face. He loves the way her nose curves up just the tiniest bit at the end. She takes a sip of her coffee and licks her lips, and Ryan feels his dick responding again. He’s going to be hard pressed to keep his hands off her for the next hour or two. _God_ why does she have this effect on him? It’s hard for him to think clearly when he’s around her because he can’t stop thinking about fucking her. He wants her so bad always. Was it always like this? He remembers it being good, but he doesn’t remember it being quite this _urgent_ all the time. But she just looks so soft and sleep-warm in her worn jeans and snow boots, soft wool jacket and mittens. He just wants to cradle her face in his hands, hold her tight to his chest, breathe her in.

 _Finally_ the barista calls his name, and he grabs his drink and his doughnut and books it back to the table. Just as he’s sliding into the chair across from Olivia, she’s pulling a bagel from her white paper bag.

“God it’s a zoo in here,” he complains.

“Yeah, it always is on Saturday morning. Best coffee on this side of town.” Olivia lifts her cup and points it toward him in a toast before taking another sip. The smile on her face is unmistakable—that’s her coffee smile. He laughs a little.

“Do you live on this side of town? God, I’m such an asshole, I never even found out where you live or what you do or … anything.”

Olivia laughs and it washes over him like a blast of warm air. He sips his coffee to keep from grinning like an idiot.

“Yeah, I live… oh, like three block south of here. My apartment’s not as nice as your’s though.”

“Ha, I didn’t really have a choice actually. That was the only building that would accept me on such short notice. And all they had available were studios.”

“That’s a nice building, though. I’ve always wanted to live in a high rise like that. Mine’s a little basement one-bedroom. It’s not bad though. I like it.”

“So what do you do?”

“I’m curating, actually. Assistant curator at the Block Museum, on Northwestern’s campus.”

“No fucking way. Did I tell you I’m at Northwestern?”

“What? I knew you were teaching, but I didn’t know it was at Northwestern! I should have known though. That’s what you always wanted to do.”

“And you’re doing just want you always wanted to do. I’m proud of you.”

“Thanks.”

Time passes easy; Olivia tells him about her job and how she ended up in Chicago, where the best pizza places are, and what there is to do on the weekends. They’re already talking about doing things together on the weekends, and Ryan’s chest feels a little tight at the thought.

After they’re both long finished with their coffee and their breakfasts, Ryan crinkles up their bags and stuffs them inside his empty coffee cup. “Want to get out of here?” he asks. The place has actually cleared out quite a bit in the hour or so they’ve been chatting, but he’s ready to have some alone time. He needs the freedom to be able to touch her, hold her hand, brush his fingers against her cheek or through her hair, without it being an awkward public display of affection.

“Yes,” Olivia says, gratefully. “Want to come see my place?” He nods and she buttons her coat, pulls her mittens on. Ryan inwardly sighs. He can’t stop thinking about touching her skin; it’s like a magnet that he can’t resist the pull of.

They get outside, into the frigid January wind, and start walking south. It’s flurrying, just a little, but the wind is blowing the snow up and around them in great white swirls. Ryan pulls his collar a little higher, trying to keep the cold out of his jacket.

After a couple blocks, Olivia turns down an alley. “Shortcut,” she says as she leads him between the buildings. Trenches of dirty snow line either side, puddles dot the pavement in the middle. The tall brick buildings block both the whipping wind and the sunshine, so it’s a little dark and shadowy back here, quiet. It doesn’t feel so much like a busy Saturday morning in Chicago.

As they round the corner, Ryan stops walking a few steps behind her, reaches forward and grabs her hand, pulling her backward and spinning her toward him. She startles a little, but she’s smiling. He works a finger up inside her coat sleeve and inside her mitten, over her pulse point on her wrist, feels her heart thumping through the thin, warm skin there.

She’s almost right up against his chest, up on her tiptoes, waiting, biting the inside of her bottom lip. He pulls her lip from between her teeth with his other thumb and then kisses her, just a brush of lips, soft and light, barely touching. She sighs into him, and he catches her at the small of her back, presses her in just a little further.

“Liv,” he whispers against her lips. His voice is rough. He doesn’t know what else he wants to say; his lips just wanted to say her name.

She closes her eyes just briefly, but he doesn’t miss it, and he takes that opportunity to kiss her again, harder, more insistent. One of her hands is curled into the lapel of his jacket, pulling him down to her level. Her lips are cold but her mouth is warm, and as their tongues slide against each other, Ryan feels greedy, like he’s stealing her warmth right out of her, but she just keeps giving and giving. He steps her backward, just two steps, until his hands are pressed against the cold brick at the building behind her. One of his legs is ankle deep in a drift of snow, freezing wet dampening his sock, but he doesn’t care. Olivia tilts her chin up, and Ryan’s mouth slots over hers easy, perfect and warm and just where he wants to be. He’s reaching, fumbling, around the buttons of her coat—he knows it’s 30 degrees out and he can’t take her coat off, but he just wants to _touch her_ and there’s too many layers of fabric in his way.

Olivia breaks away, breathless. “Ryan, we cannot fuck in this alley. It’s freezing out here.”

He steps back. “I’m sorry. I know. I’m sorry,” he says. He’s still cold, but his palms are sweating and he wipes them on his pants. His dick is half hard, throbbing inside his jeans. “I just. I can’t—” He presses a palm to his crotch, quick, tries to control himself. She’s looking at him like she’s still expecting him to say something. He changes tack, tries to go for self-deprecating sarcasm instead. “You know I’ve never been able to control myself when I’m around you,” he says, throwing her a wink and a smirk. He knows she can see right through him.

She leans in, kisses him again, but he keeps his hands sternly at his sides this time. “We are literally twenty steps away from my nice, warm living room.” She smiles against his mouth. “Think you can make it that long?”

“I don’t know,” he says, taking a dramatic step back and holding out his hand, signaling her to step in front of him. She grabs his hand as she steps out around the snow and tugs him along behind her, past two dark, closed doors, a dumpster, and a light post, and around the corner onto a side street where she drops his hand so she can get her keys out of her pocket.

She jimmies her key in the lock until it turns, like she’s done this a thousand times, which she probably has, and they enter into a narrow, drafty staircase. There’s not a lot of space to stand without falling down the stairs, and Ryan crowds in behind Olivia as she stomps the show from her boots against the soaking wet rug. The door can barely shut behind him, and he’s pressed against a row of brass mailboxes on his right and Olivia on his left.

“I told you your place was nicer than mine,” Olivia says, but not in a bad way, before leading him down the stairs. Her apartment is the door on the right and she keys it open. She has to shift her full body weight down against the knob and kick hard with her boot at the bottom corner in order to get the door open.

“This is complicated,” Ryan says, and she laughs.

“I like it,” she says, a tad defensive. She flips the light switch to reveal a small square living room, decorated just as he would imagine she would decorate her own place. Art is crammed on nearly every inch of wall space. There’s a small flat screen television in the corner. An Ikea couch stands across from it, and next to that is an antique looking chair upholstered in some awful floral pattern. Her easel stands in the corner, displaying a half finished watercolor painting. Next to it is a dining room table that is absolutely covered in paint and brushes and other art supplies.

Olivia pushes the heavy wooden door shut behind them and shrugs out of her coat.

“God, it’s cold outside,” she says. “Want some more coffee? Or hot chocolate?”

“Coffee sounds good,” Ryan replies, removing his own coat. It’s extra warm in her apartment, and he’s sweating a little. Or maybe it’s just because he’s suddenly nervous. It’s one thing to sleep with your ex-girlfriend at night, in the dark, after a couple of shots of whiskey. It’s completely another thing to visit your ex-girlfriend’s apartment in the middle of a day on a Saturday and be completely sober and coherent and still be feeling the way he’s feeling right now. He shifts from one foot to the other, then follows Olivia into the kitchen. It’s a tiny little galley kitchen, sink on one side and stove on the other, with the refrigerator at the end. Olivia’s filling the coffee pot with water.

“This place is so… _you_ ,” he says, leaning back against the counter next to the stove.

“Thank you,” she chirps lightly.

“I’m surprised you haven’t…” he starts without thinking, but doesn’t want to finish that thought.

“Haven’t what?” Olivia asks, looking over her shoulder at him.

“Nah, nothing.”

She’s persistent, laughing. “What?”

“Just haven’t … you know, found anybody out here. City of 2.5 million and all…” He shrugs.

She pauses, like she doesn’t know what to say.

“I had a lot—” she stops, thinks. “I wasn’t really _myself_ when I moved here. It took me a while to... start over, you know?” The corners of her mouth are downturned, and Ryan hates himself for taking her smile.

“I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have said it like that,” he starts, backpedaling as quickly as he can, stuttering over his words a little.

“No, no, you’re right.” But she’s not looking at him, she’s fully turned around now, scooping coffee grounds into the filter. He knows she’s counting, so he stays quiet. After she snaps the lid shut and switches it on, she turns around like nothing weird ever happened, ready to pick up right where they left off. Her eyes are glinting dark and she takes a step forward so her hips are pressed up against his, and his dick is growing very interested again very quickly. He clasps his hands around her waist, his fists resting on the small of her back, smiles down at her, easy, like they used to. It feels good.

“Where were we?” she says, and her voice is low, throaty, and sexy.

“I think we were about here…” he says and kisses her, moves his hands up her back to cradle the back of her head, tipped back into his palms as he works her mouth open.

She pulls on his shoulders and takes a step back, so he’s pressing her up against the opposite counter, and she breaks away for a half second to hoist herself up onto the counter. He cups her ass in his hands and pulls her against him, so she’s right at the edge of the counter, pushes his hands under her sweater, where she’s warm and soft, and he’s pretty sure he’s never felt anything so good in his life.

Soon enough her sweater’s off and so is her bra; his pants are unbuttoned and her hand is wrapped around his cock, already slick sliding inside his boxers, and they’re fumbling their way across the small living space. Ryan fumbles at the corner of the couch, reaching behind him for the doorknob.

“No,” Olivia says, breaking away from his lips. Ryan blinks down at her; she’s still sliding her fist easy along his shaft and he’s having more than a little trouble concentrating. “That’s the bathroom.”

“Right,” Ryan says and takes a few steps to the left to push open the other door.

Finally they make it to the bed, and Olivia pushes Ryan down onto the corner of the mattress and climbs into his lap, one thigh on either side of his hips. He touches her everywhere: hands down the back of her pants, cupping her ass, up her back and around to slide into her bra, holding the weight of her breasts in his palms, skimming his thumbs over her nipples until they’re hard little peaks in his hands and she’s squirming, panting, grinding her hips against his.

“Ryan,” she gasps, her breath fanning across his face, and then she jumps away, stands up and shoves her pants down to her ankles, gets a little twisted up while stepping out of them. Ryan mirrors her motions, peeling his own jeans and boxers off, letting her use his shoulder for support when she nearly trips over her feet kicking hers to the side. And they tumble onto the bed again, Olivia on her back and Ryan propped above her, an elbow on either side of her head. His lips are swollen, almost sore, but he can’t stop kissing her. He kisses down her neck, over her collarbone, takes her nipple in his mouth and rolls it between his tongue and his teeth.

“Ryan, Ryan,” she’s saying, pulling at his hair a little bit, until he lifts his head, and she wiggles down the bed under him, until she’s between his legs and swirling her tongue around the head of his cock and he basically can’t think anymore because he’s _so_ , it’s _so_.

She’s sucking now, wrapping her lips around him, the tip of her tongue rough against the underside, making him shiver. She wraps her hand around his ass and presses down, letting him fuck down into her mouth, hot, wet, and open, and he’s never felt anything like this before, not even with Olivia before, not ever. His hands are scrabbling against her sheets, her hair, clutching whatever he can to hold himself steady, but he doesn’t want to, not yet, _not yet_.

“Not, not yet,” he’s saying, his voice ragged, his breathing caught shallow and rough in his throat. “Nghhf not yet.” He has to force himself to stop moving, to still his hips over her head.

Olivia releases him with a slick pop and wriggles her way back up the bed. Ryan ducks his head down and kisses along the curve of her breast, her shoulder, the dip where her shoulder meets her neck. He’s trying to catch his breath, come back from the edge just a little. Just so he doesn’t blow it as soon as he gets inside her. He trails his fingers down her stomach, between her legs, sliding in the wetness already there. He slides, quick, against her clit, before slipping his pointer finger inside her and then out again. He adds his middle finger, and her legs are not only falling open, but she’s also pressing up into his hand, desperate little pants leaving her lips.

“Liv, we need, we need a—”

She throws an arm toward her nightstand. He has to slide his fingers out of Olivia’s wet heat so he can reach the nightstand drawer, but thankfully the condoms are right on top, a jumbo box of trojans—he’s not so sure how he feels about that but he doesn’t have time to think about it right now—and he shakes a few out onto the comforter. Olivia grabs one and tears it open, unrolling it deftly onto his cock, hard and wet and swollen purple, throbbing, aching to slide inside her. And when he does—slow and steady, in and out in shallow, quick thrusts, going deeper each time until he’s fully seated—he drops his head forward and _groans_ , low and guttural and _feral_. Olivia’s legs are wrapped tight around his hips, her hands clutching his shoulder blades, fingernails digging in just slightly, as he starts to thrust harder, working from his knees, moving her up the bed a little with each push.

He wraps an arm behind one of her knees, lifting her leg up so her calf rests on his shoulder, so the angle’s better for her and he’s going deeper and deeper with each thrust, quick and tight now and from his hips. He dips his head down, pressing his lips to the side of her cheek and just breathes through it, four, five, six thrusts, and she’s trembling under him, holding her breath for that split second just before she completely unravels, crying out his name and clutching his back, his hair, his shoulder, whatever she can reach. And he finally lets go, roaring, grunting, gasping as he finally can let go, his thrusts stuttering to a stop, his breath ragged in his lungs.

*

The pot of coffee has long gone cold by the time they make it back out to the kitchen, so Olivia dumps it down the drain and makes another. When Ryan comes out of the bathroom, she’s on the couch, both hands curled around a steaming mug. There’s a matching mug waiting for him on the coffee table. The TV is on, but muted—a rerun of _Friends_.

She’s wearing an oversized sweatshirt and not much else, her bare legs folded under her, but it’s not until he gets closer that he realizes it’s his sweatshirt. But not the shirt he had on today. His breath catches a little as he settles beside her, the memories—good and bad—flooding back.

“Is that my sweatshirt?” he asks. It’s worn—faded from rich maroon to almost pink, the cuffs frayed, the neckline stretched—but he’d recognize that sweatshirt anywhere. It was his favorite before he gave it to her, but he’d never ask for it back. Even after everything.

She looks down, as if she didn’t realize she was wearing it, but when she looks up her eyes are sad.

“I’m sorry,” she says, and he doesn’t know if it’s for keeping his sweatshirt for all these years or for everything that happened back then.

“Hey,” he says, brushing her shoulder with his fingertips. “I always thought it looked better on you anyway. It still does.” He tries to smile, the tried-and-true attempt at using his dimples to get her to cheer up. He knows it works. Most of the time.

She shakes her head, like she’s trying to forget. “No, I just mean…” She takes a deep breath, and Ryan squeezes her shoulder. Ten minutes ago they were snuggled in her bed, all whispered words and soft touches, and now it feels a lifetime, away. Ryan feels like the world could crack open at any second. “I’ve been holding on to this sweatshirt for _seven years_. It was all I had left of you. I wear it when I miss you, which is … a lot, Ryan. I’ve missed you a lot.”

Ryan doesn’t know what to say, torn between being happy she missed him as much as he missed her and angry that they spent these past seven years apart because _she_ was the one who left. He glances away from her, toward the TV where Monica is dancing with a turkey on her head. He clears his throat. “Liv, what _happened_?””

Olivia looks down into her coffee mug. When she doesn’t respond right away, Ryan fills the silence stretching between them. “What...what did I do wrong?”

“Oh my god, _no_ .” She reaches forward and grabs his hand, tight. “Ryan, it wasn’t you. I _loved_ you. God, I...” Tears glisten at the corners of her eyes. Her use of the past tense of the word _love_ doesn’t escape him.  “I’m sorry I made you feel like it was you.”

“How was I supposed to feel? You just...you were _gone_. Why, Liv? If you loved me, then why did you go?” His voice comes out too hard, impatient and sharp. But he’s been waiting to ask these questions for so long.

“I’m—” She blows out a forceful breath, fluttering the hair around her face. “I’m sorry, I’m just not ready to bring all that up right now. I worked through it, and I thought I was okay, but I just can’t…I just can’t.” The last word is a wobble, and Ryan can see she’s trying _hard_ not to break down. His chest feels tight.

“Okay,” he says, a gentle soothe. “Okay, it’s okay.”

“But please—” she squeezes his hand— “please believe me when I say it _was not_ you.” After a pause she adds, “And I’m _really_ happy to be doing this again.” She gives him a small smile but there’s still hurt—or fear—in her eyes, and Ryan suddenly feels like a douche for drudging it all up, for making her feel it all over again.

He nods, and she breathes a sigh of relief, her entire body relaxing. He reaches for his coffee and takes a sip, leaning into the warmth of it, letting go of the tension of that conversation. When he sits back again, he wraps an arm around Olivia’s shoulders and tugs her into his side.

“Are we really doing...this? Whatever this is?” he asks, his lips brushing her hair.

She twists her head up to smile at him. “I’m in if you’re in.”


	8. Chapter Eight (Before)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Wow, hi, it's been a while. Sorry about that! Here's chapter eight—it's mostly smut, but I'm not sorry. Enjoy! :)

She sees him in the parking lot on the day he’s moving in. She’s coming off the morning shift at Starbucks and it was insane busy. She knows her hair is a mess, she’s sweaty, and she probably smells like burnt espresso. So she dodges around a few cars and goes in the side entrance, bounding up the stairs to the second floor as fast as her tired legs will allow.

“What’s into you?” Amber asks as Olivia practically slams the door. “Are you being chased?”

“Ryan’s in the parking lot.” She takes a breath. “I didn’t want him to see this post-Starbucks disaster I have going on right now.”

Amber’s standing next to a pile of suitcases in the living room, most of them so crammed full that the zippers look on the verge of splitting.

“I’m sure Ryan himself is moving-day sweaty and gross. You look fine.” She pauses, settling her hands on her hips. “Have you talked to him since the other night?” 

“No,” Olivia sighs and tosses her purse onto the couch. She unties her barista apron and throws it over the back of a chair and then pulls at the elastic barely holding her hair in its bun.

“You fucked him and didn’t call? What are you, a dude?”

“He’s busy. He’s moving. It’s only been three days.”  _ And what if he doesn’t want to see me again? _

“He hasn’t texted you?” 

She shakes her head. “I didn’t give him my number. I just got his.” 

“What? Why?” 

“I don’t know. It seemed like a good idea at the time.” She bites her lip. “I didn’t want him to feel obligated to call me.”

“What if he  _ wants _ to call you?” Olivia rolls her eyes, turning to go down the hall to the bathroom. Amber talks to her back, “Olivia, I know you. You’re avoiding him because you think he doesn’t like you, but  _ he likes you _ .” 

“I’m not avoiding him! It’s only been three days!” She hears Amber’s exasperated sigh as she turns on the shower and starts stripping off her work clothes. Before she throws her pants in the corner, she fishes a scrap of paper from the front right pocket. A blue post-it note from his desk, numbers scrawled in black sharpie. She’s studied his handwriting so much over the past three days, she has it memorized. The looping way he writes a two, the way he barely picks up his pen between numbers. She sighs and sets the paper on the counter. Maybe she’ll text him tonight. After he’s all settled into his new apartment. Maybe. 

* * *

 

Turns out she doesn’t get the chance to text him. Amber went out with Steve for their last date before she moves across the country, and Olivia hasn’t left the apartment since she got home. She’s been alternating napping, doing laundry, and binge watching Gilmore Girls. She’s taking a frozen pizza out of the oven to eat for dinner when someone knocks on her door and she nearly dumps the pizza all over the floor. 

“ _ Shit _ ,” she mutters. It’s probably Cassie from next door looking to borrow laundry soap again. She sets the pizza on the stove and tosses the oven mitts onto the counter. When she looks out the peephole, her stomach drops. She can’t see his face because he’s so tall, but she would never forget that shoulder. Even after just one night. She takes a deep breath and swings open the door. 

“Oh, thank God,” he says when he sees her. “I’ve been knocking on doors for twenty minutes, and I’m tired of grumpy people.” He leans casually on the door frame, grin stretching across his face. 

It takes her a second to find her voice. “You’ve been  _ what _ ?”

“You never told me what apartment you lived in. How else was I supposed to find you?”

She stares at him, his dimpled cheeks and perfect messy hair, the mischief and kindness in his eyes. “You’re crazy.” 

“You’re not the first one to accuse me of such.” He glances over her head into the apartment behind her. Gilmore Girls is still playing, and her half-folded laundry is covering most of the couch. “So, uh...I understand if you’re busy, but I just wanted to say hey and I was just thinking now that we live in the same building and all, maybe we could hang out sometime. But, uh, no pressure to, uh, repeat...the other night.” He gives her a slight self-deprecating grimace, but his eyes look hopeful.

“I’m not busy.” The words rush out of her faster than she can consider them. “I, uh...I just made a pizza for dinner. Are you hungry?”

He licks his lips, and her breath catches in her throat at the memory of his tongue between her thighs. What she wouldn’t give to repeat the other night.  _ Why didn’t she just call him? _

“I’m always hungry,” he says, dimpling at her. Heat blooms between her legs and across her cheeks. She steps back from the door on slightly wobbly legs.

“I mean—” Ryan’s cheeks turn pink too. “Yes, pizza. That’d be great.”  

“It’s just a frozen cheese pizza; don’t get too excited.”

He practically bounces past her into the apartment. “Any pizza is good pizza.”

“Well, that’s true.” She crosses to the counter and pulls open a drawer for the pizza cutter. “How was your move?” she asks as she divides the slices between two paper plates. 

“Oh you know, it was a move. Got everything in though.” He’s standing at the edge of the kitchen, both his hands in his pockets, his hair curling around his ears. He licks his lips again, and the urge to kiss him is almost overwhelming. She swallows hard and turns around. 

“Want a beer?” she asks. “It’s good beer—IPA from that new microbrew place downtown.” 

“Sure.” Suddenly his voice is way closer, and her heart is pounding in her ears as she bends into the fridge.

“I bet you’ll miss the view from your house.” 

“Yeah, but this view is pretty great too.” 

The bottles clink into each other as she stands up, her cheeks on fire. She turns to face him where he’s leaning with one hip against the counter, just an arm’s length away now.

“I mean...that was timed badly.” He takes a step forward, half laughing, and lifts a hand to brush her hair away from her face. “I meant your face, not your ass.” His voice is low, the corners of his lips tugging up into a grin. “Though, you do have a great ass.” 

She finally gives into the urge, surging up onto her toes to press her mouth to his. He seems to have been expecting it because he catches her by her waist, pressing into her, the two bottles of beer cradled between them. Her lips part under his and her breath catches as he briefly licks into her mouth before pulling away. He arches an eyebrow at her but doesn’t step back or move his hand from her back.

“I’m really glad you came over,” she says, breathless. 

“Me too,” he says, taking the bottles of beer from her. He opens them both and then hands one back to her. He leans back against the counter and takes a swig, and then another, draining almost half of it before he sighs. “Listen, Olivia, I’m just gonna come right out and say this. I really like you. And the other night...it wasn’t just a fuck for me.” He’s talking fast now, like he’s physically forcing the words out of his mouth before he loses his ever-present confidence. Her heart is in her throat. “And I think you feel the same way, but if you don’t, please—

“I’m sorry I didn’t call,” she blurts, and he stops short. She pulls the post-it note with his number scrawled on it from the pocket of her jeans and shows it to him. “I wanted to call you so many times. But I just...convinced myself that you probably didn’t want to hear from me.” She takes a deep breath. “I sort of have an issue with...believing that guys actually like me? God, that sounds pathetic when I say it outloud. But...any guy I’ve ever opened up to only wanted the sex, or called me too needy, or never wanted to introduce me to his friends, and I—” There’s a lump in her throat and she covers her face with her hands until she can control herself. She doesn’t want to cry right now. 

Ryan pulls her into his chest, wrapping his arms around her shoulders. “Do you mean that douchebag from the party a couple weeks ago?” She nods against his chest. “Olivia, I like you.  _ I like you _ . I don’t get tired of saying it—I’ll tell you a hundred times a day if that’s what you need to hear to believe me. I like you. I want to be with you.”

“I like you, too,” she says, her words muffled by his shirt. 

“Hey,” he says softly, and she leans back to look up into his face. “Can I kiss you again?’   


She nods, but he doesn’t move in right away. 

A beat passes before he asks, “Can I do more than just kiss you again?” 

She nods again. 

Her lips are already parted when he kisses her, languid and soft, his tongue sliding against hers. His hands travel over her body, brushing over her breasts, her hips, her ass, until she’s practically panting into his mouth. 

She clings to the front of his shirt as he gets his hands under her and lifts her up, their mouths never parting. He wraps her legs around his waist, and she can feel him hard and throbbing up against her, and she breaks away from him for a moment so she can catch a breath. 

“Ryan,” she says, grinding herself down against him. His pupils are totally lust blown, his lips pink and swollen. “I want you.  _ Now _ .” 

He grins wickedly and turns them away from the counter. He lowers her hastily onto the table, knocking aside the vase of flowers and pile of mail that was sitting there, but she doesn’t even care. As soon as she’s horizontal, she’s grappling at his belt, sliding her hands into his waistband and over his length. He grunts, bracing his palms against the table on either side of her head and thrusting into her hand. She cranes her neck up and catches his parted lips, biting down softly on the bottom one, and he practically growls in pleasure. 

“Olivia,” he grits out between clenched teeth, stilling his hips with visible effort. “Olivia. We need a condom.” 

“Fuck,” she mutters. Her pants are halfway down her thighs, and she’s practically aching for him. She slowly draws her hands out of Ryan’s pants and he groans heavily. 

“Just...just tell me where they are and I’ll get one,” he says, his voice desperate. 

“In the bathroom,” she says, gesturing toward the hallway. “In the medicine cabinet.” 

While he’s gone, she wriggles out of her pants the rest of the way, and he’s back by the time her panties hit the floor. 

“Fuck, you look hot,” he says, tearing into the condom with his teeth. 

He grabs her by the ankles and pulls her toward him, until her ass is at the very edge of the table, sliding his fingers inside her briefly before he rolls on the condom. He grips her hips so hard she thinks she might wake up with bruises where his fingertips are, but she’s too into it to care. She reaches up to grab him by the back of the neck and pull his face down to hers and kisses him, sloppy and open mouthed. They’re still kissing when he slides into her, which is a good thing because she makes a noise that her neighbors definitely would have heard otherwise. 

Their bodies move together like they’ve been doing this for years not days, and Olivia’s orgasm is quaking through her faster than she ever thought possible. Ryan’s not far behind her, and he nearly collapses on top of her after, landing his forearm on top of the fallen bouquet of flowers. 

“Oh my god,” Olivia says, mostly to herself. She can’t believe she was just fucked on her kitchen table. 

“Are you okay?” he murmurs, and when she turns her head to look at him, his eyes are closed, his face totally blissed out. 

“Way more than okay,” she replied, smiling. His eyes flutter open and he pushes up from the table with a grunt, taking her hand and pulling her up too. 

“Go get cleaned up,” he says. “I’ll fix up out here.”

When she comes out of the bathroom, he’s leaning against the counter, eating cold pizza. His hair is a mess and his pants are still unbuttoned. There’s a bottle of clorox cleaner on the counter next to their two abandoned beers. 

“I found this under the sink,” he says, pointing to the bottle with his half-eaten slice of pizza. “I cleaned off the table. Sorry about the flowers, though.” 

She glances over to where he’s straightened the mail and reinverted the now-empty vase. The smashed bouquet is sitting in the top of the trash can. Beyond the kitchen, Netflix is asking “Are you still watching Gilmore Girls?” 

“God, don’t worry about the flowers,” she says, grabbing her own slice of pizza. “I don’t give a fuck about the flowers after... _ that _ .” 

He grins and hoists himself up onto the counter. They much their pizza in silence, but it’s not uncomfortable, and Olivia feels really happy for the first time in maybe months. 

After a few minutes, she opens the fridge to get a couple more beers, and when she closes the door she happens to notice the only thing that’s stuck up with a magnet.

“Hey,” she says before she can think about it. She hands him the beer. “Do you want to be my date to my brother’s wedding?” 

He pauses for just a fraction of a second while opening his beer, and she’s suddenly panicking. She just asked him to a  _ really _ serious occasion, to meet her entire family, after they’ve merely fucked two times. They haven’t even been on a real date.  _ Oh my god _ . 

“Are you asking me out?” His tone is teasing, but his smile is genuine. 

“Yes?” she says, hesitant. “I mean—sorry, I don’t know why that just popped into my head. You probably have better things to do than to go to a random wedding in nowhere, Kansas next month.” 

“I’d love to,” he says.

“But I didn’t even tell you when it is.” 

“I don’t care when it is. I don’t have any plans this summer.” He hops down from the counter and steps toward her, slinging one arm around her waist and pulling her close. “And I’d like nothing more than to be your date to your brother’s wedding.” 


	9. Chapter Nine

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Officially considering this my "practice novel" so I can hopefully beat my perfectionism and just get it posted. :) Also there's just... a lot of smut in this chapter. Enjoy!

Ryan darts around his apartment, picking up stray socks and shirts, coffee mugs and paper plates. He dumps a stack of newspapers into the trash can and sweeps a pile of dirty dishes into the dishwasher, kicks a stack of broken down boxes into the bottom of his mostly empty coat closet. He’s finally gotten around to unpacking the rest of his belongings, but he hasn’t taken the empty boxes down to the dumpster yet, and he doesn’t have time right now. He’s taking Olivia out for her birthday tonight, and he knows they will probably end up back here and he at least wants it to be presentable. He’s gotten messier as he’s gotten older—he used to be such a neat freak. It mostly went downhill after Olivia left, and keeping his living space neat just took too much energy that he didn’t have. Olivia knew him mostly in his neat-freak years, and he doesn’t want her to think he’s a total slob now. 

He checks the bathroom, picking things up off the counter and stowing them in the medicine cabinet and tossing them into the cupboard under the sink. He catches a glimpse of himself in the mirror and realizes he really needs to get dressed if he wants to be anywhere close to on time to pick her up. 

His wardrobe is in the corner, between the foot of his bed and the window, the doors are standing open, clothes spilling out. He starts shoving things back in, tossing the dirties into the hamper to his left, cursing under his breath every time something inadvertently lands on the tile floor. He manages to find a pair of khakis and a decently unwrinkled button-down shirt, and he throws them on and slams the wardrobe doors shut. He glances around, quick—the place really doesn’t look too bad. That’s a perk of not having lived here too long yet. 

Back in the bathroom, he runs his hands through his hair, sprays a little cologne, and then he grabs his keys and his wallet and he’s out the door. 

He really doesn’t use his car much; he’s been thinking about selling it actually. He can walk to work, he can walk to Olivia’s apartment, and he’s become accustomed to taking the L anywhere else he needs to go. City life is starting to agree with him. But tonight, he heads down to the underground parking garage. Tonight he’s taking Liv to a fancy new restaurant down in Old Town, which would take an hour or more on the L. Plus he doesn’t  _ want _ her to have to ride public transportation tonight.

He idles in front of her apartment and hops out to go pick her up. He realizes this is the first date they’ve been on since they…he doesn’t know what to call what they’re doing now. Surely it’s more than just fuck buddies? It is to him, anyway.

She looks gorgeous when she opens the door, her blonde hair bouncing down over her shoulders in big waves, a purple dress with a black sweater, tights, high heels. 

“Wow,” he says, whistles a little just to make her laugh. He offers her his arm, and she wedges her hand into the crook of his elbow with a smile. 

“Where are we headed?” she asks. 

“I told you, it’s a surprise.” He opens her door for her and then runs around to the other side of the car and jumps into the driver’s seat. 

They ride in silence for a little while, fingers intertwined on the center console. Olivia’s watching out the window, and Ryan knows she’s trying to figure out where they’re going. She loves surprises, but she hates secrets. 

“Do you want me to just tell you?” he asks, teasing. 

“No!” She’s defensive. “Let me try to figure it out. I like the surprise.” 

He squeezes her hand and she squeezes back.

She does guess the restaurant, but not until they’re only two blocks away, so Ryan’s still counting it a successful surprise. 

A bottle and a half of wine and an excess of pasta later, they’re splitting a piece of tiramisu when Ryan pulls a tiny wrapped box from his pocket. 

“Happy birthday,” he says, sliding it across the table. 

“Ry!” she exclaims. “You didn’t—you didn’t have to! You didn’t have to do any of this.” But Ryan would have bought her twenty birthday gifts, just to see that glint of excitement in her eyes. 

“It’s not—it’s not what it looks like, but,” he’s stuttering over his words, a little nervous for her to open it. He hopes it’s not too much. “Well, just, just open it.” He wipes his sweaty palms against his thighs. 

She tears the paper slowly—he’s glad he had it wrapped at the store—and reveals the little silver box, popping the lid off and lifting the necklace out. She peers at the pendant—just a little silver circle engraved with two dates—May 3, 2011 and January 11, 2017.

“I know it’s—I mean, I hope it’s not,” he starts, then clears his throat. “I know we’ve only been doing this, whatever this is, for a couple weeks. But, Liv—” he reaches for her hand across the table. Her eyes are glassy—maybe tears or maybe from the wine. “I really feel like those two days, they… they changed me. And I just. I just… wanted you to have them.” 

“It’s beautiful,” she breathes, still looking at it. “I love it, thank you.” She works the clasp gently and secures it around her neck. “You’ve never bought me jewelry before,” she says, fingering it lightly where it sits around her neck. 

“Yes I have,” he says, taking a sip of his drink. But then he realizes—the only jewelry he ever bought her was an engagement ring that he never got to give to her, that he sold at K.T. Pawn in downtown Minneapolis to a guy named Dale that gave him a sad look but still undersold him. His throat closes a little around his mouthful of wine, and he suppresses a cough, clearing his throat instead. “I had to have,” he recovers. Olivia doesn’t seem to notice. 

“Nope,” she says. “I can’t believe it took you so long to get around to it.” She’s teasing, but it still stings a little. 

They finish up dinner, and Ryan leaves a generous tip for their waiter and the valet. The three glasses of wine he had left him feeling good. He glances at Olivia in his passenger seat, follows the long line of her leg up to the hem of her skirt. He can’t wait to get her back to his apartment and peel that dress off of her. 

And that’s just what he does. First, he pretends to be a gentleman, pretends he hasn’t been undressing her in his mind all night long, and escorts her upstairs, takes her coat, offers her a drink. He waits until they’re seated on the couch, until she’s had a sip of her whiskey, until she’s turned toward him, one leg bent up onto the seat cushion, before he kisses her, cupping her face in his hands. He forces himself to move slow, to savor. It is her birthday after all. 

Her lips open in a sigh and as he slides his tongue into her mouth, he slides his hands up her thighs, a smidge of a hangnail catching a little on her tights—he can’t wait for summer, when she can wear skirts and shorts bare-legged, when he can reach down and instantly feel her skin against his palms without having to peel through layers to get there. He reaches the hem of her skirt and lingers there for a moment while he kisses her. He’s ready to take his time, to take it slow, until she reaches forward and cups her hand around his crotch, making him inhale sharp against her lips. She presses in, rubs her palm against his shaft through pants and boxer briefs.

He presses her back, and she goes easy, laying down under him, her shoulders and head propped a little on the arm of the couch. His arm is braced behind her head, but he presses his hips down, grinds against her. She lets her legs fall open, one foot on the floor, and kicks her shoe off the other and wraps it around his waist, pressing into the small of his back with her foot. The gasp that leaves her mouth when he presses against her again is everything to him, and he can feel himself get even stiffer at the sound, and her resulting moan lets him know that she can feel it too. 

“Ryan,” she half moans. “I want to be naked.” 

“That can be arranged,” he says, leaning down to kiss her neck. He sits back on his knees, between her legs, and reaches up her skirt for the waistband of her tights, peels them down her legs along with her panties, and tosses them over the back of the couch. She’s going to have to sit up for him to get her dress off, so he pulls her up by the hand, and she turns so he can pull the zipper down her back. Once it’s down, she turns back, quick, and pulls the sleeves down her arms, revealing her collarbone, her shoulders.

“How do you get that zipped by yourself?” he asks, taking hold of her waist and pulling her into him so he can kiss the top of her shoulder, where she’s spotted with freckles, so light no one would ever know unless they were right up close. This close. Close enough that his nose can touch her skin and he can inhale her scent, heady and fresh. He knows all the places she has freckles. 

“Magic,” she says, a ragged whisper. She holds the back of his head as he works his mouth over her skin, kissing and sucking and licking. When he gets to her ear, he feels her whole body shudder against him.

“Ryan,” she says. “Take me to bed.” 

“Gladly,” he replies, and promptly scoops her up off the couch, one arm around her shoulders and one under her knees, and carries her across the room to his bed. 

* * *

The next morning is Saturday, and they get brunch at one of their favorite diners, just a few minutes walk away from Ryan’s apartment. Greasy hashbrowns and runny eggs and toast smeared with butter. Olivia licks her fingers as she finishes her plate. 

“So, what are your plans for today?” she asks, pushing her empty plate to the edge of the table. 

“Well, since you ask...it’s Zach’s daughter’s first birthday today. So I’ve been roped into attending the party, and I was wondering…” He gives her a sort of sideways look and waggles his eyebrows. He puts on his most charming smile, showing his deepest dimples. She laughs and he feels like he’s won a prize. 

“A first birthday party? Sounds fun. What could be bad about that?”

“We have to go get a present first,” he says like it’s a warning, and she laughs again. 

“We’ll just make a stop at Target. It’ll be fun. C’mon, let’s do it.” She reaches for the check before he can blink. “I’ve got this one,” she says, sternly. “Last night was more than enough.” 

As they stand, he nudges her with his shoulder. He knows the party will be fun, especially if they’re together, but he can’t help but just want to take her home and spend the rest of the day naked with her in his bed. But if he had his way, that’s all they’d ever do, so he pulls on his coat, lets Olivia pay for his breakfast, and then drives them both to the Target out toward Mt. Prospect, where Zach and his wife live. 

Olivia helps him pick out an outfit and some kind of toy that whirls and lights up and makes a ton of noise for little Addison. Ryan loves it because it will annoy Zach to death. 

When they roll up to Zach’s suburban house, complete with a  _ Happy 1st Birthday Addison _ banner out front and a bunch of colorful balloons, Ryan feels a twinge of jealousy. Not that he necessarily wants to live in the suburbs, or even that he wants to have kids. But he’s jealous that Zach seems to have it all figured out. He’s happy; he’s got his wife and his daughter and his suburban house and his cushy job. Ryan might never have any of those things, and that’s okay, but he feels like he’s been chasing down his happy ending for years, and he thought he would be a lot closer to it by now, by the time he’s approaching his 28th birthday. Twenty-eight seems dangerously close to thirty.

The party isn’t as bad as Ryan expected. For some reason, he’d expected throngs of screaming children running everywhere, failing to realize that one-year-olds don’t really  _ run _ yet. Even though they certainly do scream, there’s only a handful in attendance, and, despite the living room looking like a clown threw up all over it and all the food being tiny and animal shaped, it’s actually not so bad. It’s mostly adults, friends and family, and there’s even beer. 

“Ryan, hi!” Zach’s wife, Andrea, comes up to them near the gift table when they’re adding theirs to the pile. She gives Ryan an awkward hug. “Who’s this?” she asks, gesturing to Olivia. 

“Oh, this is Olivia, my, uh, my.” He stumbles over the word  _ girlfriend _ . They both said they’re  _ in it _ , but does that mean  _ girlfriend _ ? They’ve been too busy fucking to really put a label on it. 

“I’m Ryan’s girlfriend,” Olivia says for him, sticking out her hand. She shakes Andrea’s hand, but she looks up at Ryan and smiles. He dimples back at her, obvious and awkward, but not even close to caring. He slings an arm around Olivia’s shoulder and pulls her into his side and she giggles. He keeps her close the whole way through the party—watching little Addison open her gifts and smash her cake and cry when everyone sings her “Happy Birthday.” 

Later, they’re standing in the kitchen, and he’s drinking a beer while Olivia talks with Andrea about daycare and Pinterest and some other shit, and Ryan’s trying to pay attention but he’s sort of glazing over when Zach comes to his rescue, clapping him on the shoulder. 

“Hey, man, thanks for coming. I know this isn’t really your scene. Suburbs and all that.” 

“What are you talking about dude? This is great. I’m glad I could be here for your little lady’s first birthday. It’s fun.” His smile feels a little forced—he’s still sort of thinking of getting Olivia back to his bed, naked. Or into the hallway bathroom and feeling her up. Either would do at this point.

“Glad you were able to bring your girlfriend with you,” he says. “Glad you guys could work it out.”

“Yeah, me too,” Ryan replies. 

* * *

“So, you’re officially my girlfriend now?” Ryan asks when they’re on the way back to the city. He’s smirking at her across the car, eyes still on the road. She hits him lightly in the arm. 

“Don’t make it a big deal,” she says, giggling. “But, yeah. I mean, if you want.” She’s full-on laughing now, and he loves the way it fills the car. He can’t help but smile. 

“It is a big deal,” he says. “It’s a big deal to me.” 

“Is it?” she asks. Her laughter stops so suddenly it’s like a vacuum sucked it all out of the car. 

“Yeah,” he admits, suddenly embarrassed. “Is it a big deal to you?”

“It’s a huge deal to me.” Her hand reaches for his on the center console, squeezes his fingers in hers. 

“Can I tell you something?” he asks. Might as well get it out there, be one hundred percent clear about where he stands in this relationship, if it can be called that. 

“Of course.” She glances over at him and smiles, encouraging. 

“I don’t…. I don’t think I ever stopped loving you,” he says, quiet and serious. And when he looks over at her, she’s smiling but her eyes are so sad. Like, rip your heart out of your chest and slice it into bits sad. He doesn’t understand. This is what he doesn’t ever understand. Might not ever understand. 

“Ryan, I…” she trails off, but she’s still clinging to his fingers, tight. 

“It’s okay. I know it’s weird, what we’re doing now. You don’t have to say anything. You don’t have to respond at all. I just wanted to be clear about the way I felt. No secrets.”

She takes a deep breath, smiles again, repeats his words. “No secrets.” She sounds sort of wistful sad. She’s looking out the opposite window now, and that moment didn’t go at all how Ryan thought it would. He concentrates on the road, tries not to give in to the bitter sting of rejection that’s burning at the back of his eyes. There’s always going to be this part of him that fears that Olivia doesn’t want him, is going to leave him again. He’s trying to keep it pressed down, to not let it overtake him, but it flares up every so often, and it fucking  _ hurts _ . 

He’ll take whatever time he can get, he tells himself. He loves her that much. He’ll take this time they have now, he’s not about to push her away by asking her to commit further. He’ll take the time she’ll give him gladly, without complaint, and if she leaves, he’ll deal with it then. For right now, he doesn’t want this to ruin their night. For right now, he pushes the thought away. Far away. 

They drive the rest of the way back to his apartment in silence, stealing glances at each other every now and then. Slowly, the silence turns from awkward to full of sexual tension, and Ryan doesn’t quite know how that happened but suddenly he wants her right fucking  _ now _ , and he can’t get back to his apartment fast enough. They pull into the parking garage, and Olivia is on him immediately, jumping into his lap practically, pawing at his chest and his face as he kisses her full on the mouth, all lips and hands and tongues. He slides his hands under her shirt, runs his fingers along the bottom edge of her bra, teasing, and then reaches for the clasp at the back. Her fingers are on the button of his jeans.  

“Do you want to go upstairs?” she asks, breathless between kisses. She pops the button open and slides her hand into the front of his pants, her palm hot against his cock, already stiff inside his boxer briefs. 

“No,” he says, shaking his head, his fingers still working at the clasps at the back of her bra. He grunts with the effort of trying to get it undone—why are bras so fucking  _ difficult _ —and then again in relief when it gives and her breasts fall forward. He catches them in his hands and groans at the feeling of her nipples hardening against his palms. 

“Are we gonna get caught?” she asks, nibbling from his ear down his neck. She’s going to leave hickeys on his skin, but he doesn’t care. 

“No,” he says again. That’s about all the brain function he can muster up right now, considering all of the blood in his body seems to be concentrated at his dick. The parking garage is dark, and really is hardly ever used by the other people that live in his building. He’s never seen anyone else down here unless it’s right before or right after work. And they’re in a spot near the back. The chances of them getting caught are very slim. He thinks. 

“Liv,” he pants. “I’ve gotta have you now.”

She nods against him, working his cock out of his shorts. “Ugh,” she grunts. She’s trying to shove her pants down, but she’s not having much luck. “Why didn’t I wear a skirt today.” 

He chuckles, a gruff bark from deep in his throat, and helps her get one leg of her pants down over her knee and off her foot. Then she shimmies back over him, and his dick twitches in anticipation, the tip of it nudging against her pussy. 

“W-wait. Liv. What about—” 

She cuts him off. 

“I’m on the pill.” She’s panting with the effort of holding herself up over him, of holding herself back. “And I’m clean. Are you clean?”

“Yeah, I’m clean.” 

“Okay, then,” she says, and then sinks down onto him, and his groan punches out of him, is loud enough to rattle the car windows. 

“Oh  _ god, Liv, _ ” he groans as she starts to move. She pushes her legs open as far as they will go, one knee pressed up against the door and the other wedged between the seat and the gear shifter, and rocks against him, all tight heat and wet hot friction, and he never minds using a condom but without one it’s fucking incredible. 

One of his hands is on her ass and the other is gripping the back of her neck, fingers tangled in her hair, pressing her forehead to his. They’re both breathing hard, hot breath mingling together between them, and he’s so close to the edge when—

Headlights sweep through the car, and Olivia freezes immediately. Ryan looks up; their windows are completely fogged, and he wouldn’t be surprised if the car had been rocking fairly hard just then, based on how much they were moving. Anyone with half a brain would know what they were doing in here. They’re still for a few minutes, but nothing happens. They hear the other car shut off and the door slam, footsteps away from their car, and then… nothing. 

“I thought for sure we were busted,” Olivia giggles. 

“Me too,” Ryan breathes against her. His cock is twitching inside her, and she slowly starts to move again. She pulls up up, until he’s almost out completely, and then sinks back down, slowly. After a few times, he’s tired of the tease, and he grips her hips in his hands, pressing her down, rocking her back and forth on his cock, and she’s moaning and gasping and saying incoherent things, or maybe he’s just lacking the brainpower to understand her at the moment. His mouth is open, his lips pressed against her cheek, breathing heavy against her skin. Her hands are pressed into his shoulders, nails digging into his muscles through scarf and coat and shirt. 

When she’s right there—he knows because she’s holding her breath, trembling just barely—he pushes up against her, grinds his pelvic bone against her clit, and she falls apart in great shuddering gasps against his chest, and the clench of her around him pushes him to his own peak and he spills inside her, clutching her head against his shoulder. 

They sit there for a few minutes, catching their breath, his cock softening inside her. He rubs circles on her back, between her shoulder blades, and smoothes her hair down as she breathes against him. Eventually, she pulls away, sits back on his knees. 

“Now do you want to go upstairs?” she asks with a grin. 

“I would love to.”


	10. Chapter Ten (Before)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is my favorite chapter. :) Enjoy!

“Where the hell are we?” Ryan’s looking down at his phone, trying fruitlessly to get the GPS to work, but they’re too much in the middle of nowhere to get any cell service. Olivia’s eyes are dead set forward, looking out the windshield at the huge expanse of nothing that she’s driving through. They haven’t seen any signs of civilization in at least an hour, and Olivia’s beginning to get a little concerned that they might actually run out of gas if they don’t find a gas station soon, but she hasn’t said anything yet.

“ _ Kansas _ ,” she says, edged with snark and accompanied by an eyeroll so hard that her eyes actually  _ hurt _ when she does it. She’s starving because they haven’t eaten since before they left at the crack of dawn that morning, and she’s fucking tired of Ryan asking where they are every ten minutes. She can see Ryan’s head snap around in her peripheral vision, and she instantly feels bad. She sighs. “We’ll get there, I promise. I know where I’m going.” 

“Just because you drove out here to visit your brother once five years ago, doesn’t mean you know where you’re going.” 

“I  _ know _ where I’m going, Ryan.” Olivia huffs air out between her lips, up toward her hair that’s hanging in her face. It doesn’t do shit, so she brushes at it roughly with her hand. 

“Okay,” Ryan says, lifting his hands in defense. He’s obviously still not buying it but doesn’t want to further the fight. He reaches toward the radio instead, turning the volume up and skimming through stations to try to find some music. When everything comes in as static or talk radio, he pulls the book of CDs from under the seat and starts flipping through. He looks excited when he finally chooses one and slides it into the player. He cranks up the volume as the song starts. It’s an old Blink 182 album—they used to be Olivia’s favorite band. 

“Blink 182?” Olivia asks with some disdain. She doesn’t know why she’s being this way; she likes Blink 182 (it’s her CD, of course she likes it), but it just feels like Ryan is trying to make her feel better and she doesn’t  _ want _ to feel better right now. 

“Song for the weekend,” Ryan says. She glances over at him, and he looks so hopeful, that she can’t help but crack a smile.

“ _ This _ song?”

“Yes! It’s a blank song. Do you have any memories associated with this song already? Does it make you think of anything?” 

“It reminds me of being fourteen.” 

“Anything else?”

“Not really,” she shrugs.

“Well, now you will. Now whenever you hear this song, it’ll remind you of this weekend. It’ll make you think of us—of the time we got hopelessly lost on the way to your brother’s wedding in Wichita.” 

“We are not hopelessly lost!” Olivia says, defensive, but she’s laughing. She reaches across the car to swat his shoulder, and he chuckles. 

“Admit it, Liv. We are pretty lost.” 

“Fine! We’re a little lost. But not  _ hopelessly _ . I’ll get us to where we need to be. I  _ mostly _ know where we are, okay.” 

“Okay,” Ryan says, still laughing. He slides an arm around her shoulder, scooting to the very edge of his seat. “I just wanted you to admit you were lost.” 

“You’re a jerk,” Olivia says, glancing over at him out of the corner of her eye, but she’s smiling a little. 

“I know,” Ryan concedes. “Now why don’t you pull off up here, so I can remind you why you love me.” 

Olivia looks at him like he’s lost his fucking mind, which she’s pretty sure he actually has. “Ryan, I’m starving. Can we please find something to eat first?” Just as she finishes her sentence, a blinking red stop light comes into view up ahead. She looks at Ryan, and his eyes are glinting. 

“Even better,” he says. 

They pull into a gas station that has a diner on one end, the car sputtering, lurching a little, on fumes. Ryan fills up the gas tank, and then they head into the diner. It’s the kind of place that has all its local regulars, the kind of place where the soles of your shoes slip on the floor a little bit because everything is covered in a thin residue of greasiness. Olivia doesn’t think they’ve changed their decor since the fifties. It’s just the kind of place they love. 

Ryan orders a burger and a milkshake and Olivia orders a mile high stack of pancakes—she could eat breakfast for every meal and never get sick of it. She’s got some coffee in her belly now and is feeling much better while they wait for their food to come. 

They’re tucked into a back corner booth, right next to the bathrooms, and Ryan’s still looking at her like he wants to eat her alive. It’s buzzing through her, crawling down her spine and between her legs. The only other people in the place are a few middle-aged men drinking coffee at the counter, plus their waitress and the cook. They might not get another chance for a while, unless they want to do it in the middle of the desert. She’s feeling brave. She takes a breath, locks eyes with Ryan and tips her head toward the bathroom a little, and drains the rest of her coffee cup. Then she scoots out of the booth and walks into the bathroom.

It takes approximately two and a half minutes for Ryan to show up, and he’s all over her immediately, crowding her into a stall and kicking the door shut, tongue in her mouth and hands in her hair and body pressing her tight up against the cold tile wall. Public bathrooms always sort of grossed Olivia out, but she’s horny enough right now that it doesn’t matter. 

Ryan’s fingers are down the front of her pants and into her panties, where she’s already wet and wanting. He pushes against her, his hard-on straining against his zipper, and Olivia takes pity on him and flicks the button open. He groans into her ear as she takes him in her hand, hot and slick. She surges up to tiptoe, thighs straining against her jeans to try to get her legs wide enough. Ryan’s fingers are slipsliding through her wetness and she’s already shaking, so he drops to his knees and wedges both hands behind her ass and pulls her forward. She almost falls over, her thighs are still constrained by her jeans and the toes of her Chuck Taylor’s are just skimming the floor, but she manages to keep herself upright with her hands pressed flat, hard, back against the tiles behind her as Ryan delves his tongue deep, brushing her clit immediately and ruthlessly, the concentrated force behind his movements is half of her arousal. She comes in less than a minute, fast and strong, biting down hard on her lip to stifle her scream. 

He doesn’t waste any time in standing up and pushing down his jeans, just below his balls, and his cock is thick and heavy, curving upwards. Olivia drops to her knees and takes him into her mouth at the same time, licking away the salty precome at the tip. She reaches one hand up to cup his balls and hears a muffled groan. When she glances up at him through her lashes, he’s got a fist to his mouth, stifling his sounds. He’s thrusting forward now, fucking her mouth, and Olivia’s eyes are watering a little, but then he shoots off, salty and warm over her tongue.

Ryan’s not even finished groaning when she hops to her feet and wiggles her jeans back over her hips, trying to ignore the mess in her underwear. She buttons and zips as she heads toward the door. She’s sure they’ve been in there too long; their food was probably delivered to their table ages ago. Either that or their table’s been cleared because their waitress thought they’d left. 

Olivia glances quick back over her shoulder as she opens the door, and Ryan is buttoning his jeans, running his hands through his hair. He looks up and catches her eye, winks just before she’s out the door. 

Blessedly, the waitress is just setting down their food as Olivia approaches their table. 

“Thank you,” Olivia says as she slides into the booth, trying to sound as casual as possible and not at all breathless or like she just got eaten out in the bathroom stall. The waitress gives her a knowing look, and Olivia’s cheeks flush. 

“Sure thing, doll,” the waitress says, and just as she turns to leave, Ryan is walking up and they nearly collide. Ryan looks hot as hell and totally fucked out—his hair is a mess, his cheeks are tinged pink, his eyes a little glassy. 

“Sorry,” he says, level and cool, and steadies the waitress with a hand on her elbow. The waitress is flustered, throwing her hands around, and Olivia can’t help but giggle as Ryan slides into his side of the booth. He quirks an eyebrow at her, and she loses her breath a little bit. Sometimes the force of his attractiveness just  _ hits _ her, staggering. His sharp blue-green eyes and that mop of hair, long in all the right places and perfectly tousled, perfectly grab-able, always looking sort of just-fucked. His jawline is something inherently  _ virile _ , perfectly stubbled and sharp all the way back to his ears. And when he smiles it just...tunnels her focus down to only him, everything in the background blurry lines and fuzzy shapes.

She’s never felt this way about anyone before. She’s about to introduce him to her parents and her brother and her entire extended family, and she knows everyone is going to love him. How could they not? 

“What?” Ryan asks, popping a fry into his mouth. He caught her staring at him, dreamily, like a seventh-grade school girl. 

“I love you,” she says. It’s the first time she’s told him, though she’s known for a while, but it just popped right out of her mouth. She had no control over it. She covers her mouth with her hand. 

But Ryan doesn’t look surprised at all. He just smiles that winning, charming smile as he says, “I love you, too.” 

And then he throws a fry at her. 

* * *

Their song is playing again, guitar riffs drifting out the open windows of the car into the sticky summertime night air and evaporating into nothing. They played it so many times this weekend that it’s been stuck in Olivia’s head for days now. She used to know every word, now she knows every beat, every breath, every sigh. She’s sick of it but not—Ryan was right though, every time she hears it she’ll think of this weekend. She’ll think of Ryan’s smiling face looking at her across the car; she’ll think of the way he looked at her across the reception hall, like he’d never seen anything so beautiful; she’ll think of the way he spun her in circles across the dance floor, his laugh so loud it carried above everything else; she’ll think of the way he held her close and whispered in her ear as they watched Jackson and Anna climb into their car and drive away, the back window proclaiming  _ Just married! _ , the clatter of tin cans following them into the night. 

Now they’re spread out on the hood of the car, looking at the sky, inky and speckled with dots of glowy white, passing a cheap bottle of white wine between them. Olivia takes a sip, the opening of the bottle warm where Ryan’s lips were just moments before.

“This was so fun,” she says. She’s just beginning to feel on the edge of tipsy, giggly mostly and a little light. Like a bubble. She’s so happy she feels a little untethered, like she could float right away, right into the night, and never come back. It’s the sort of happiness that you want to impress onto your brain, sear into your memory so you never forget the feeling, so you can revisit it whenever you want. That never quite works the way she hopes it will, but she tries anyway. This moment, this laying on the hood of her junker car in the middle of the night, Blink-182 spilling from the speakers behind them, feeling Ryan’s body heat seep into her from the metal hood of the car. She desperately hopes that this moment will be with her until the day she dies. 

“It was fun,” Ryan says, taking the bottle of wine as she hands it to him. “I like your family.” 

“I’m taking you to every wedding I’m ever invited to, okay? You were the life of the party.” 

“I’m cool with that.” It’s quiet between them for a moment, but they’ve never felt the need to fill the silence. It’s one of Olivia’s favorite things about being around Ryan—she doesn’t feel like she has to  _ do _ anything. She can just be. Just be her. 

Ryan shifts next to her, rolls to his side a little and props himself up on an elbow so he’s looking down into her eyes. “Liv, what if…” he trails off, and she looks at him quizzically. He seems nervous all of a sudden, and she knows it’s not from the wine. Half a bottle might put her in the tipsy-going-on-drunk camp, but Ryan’s nowhere near buzzed on half a bottle of wine. 

“What if...what if  _ our _ wedding was the next wedding we went to together?”

Olivia feels like all the breath has been punched out of her, her lungs are threatening to collapse with nothing to fill them up and her heart’s pounding double time to make up for it. For a moment she can’t get her voice to work. 

“What?” she whispers. 

“I’m not…” Ryan’s fumbling around his words. “I’m not  _ proposing _ , I just—”

Olivia can hardly hear him through the roaring in her ears. “Are you saying you want to marry  _ me _ ?” 

“Of course I want to marry you,” Ryan says, so matter of fact, like he’s talking about whether or not he wants to eat dinner. “But I don’t wanna—no pressure. I mean, I’m not trying to rush or anything I just–”

Ryan can’t get another word out because Olivia reaches up and wraps a hand around the back of his neck and pulls his lips down to hers. He almost loses his balance with the sudden force of it but manages to catch his hand on the cool metal of the hood beside her head, almost in her hair. He’s still holding the bottle of wine in his other hand. When she pulls away, his face is stretched into a crazy grin. 

“What?” Olivia says, defensive. 

“Does this mean if I asked you to marry me, you’d say yes?”

“Of course I’d say yes, you idiot.” 

Ryan settles onto his back, takes another sip of wine and then passes the bottle back to her. He gives her a sidelong glance from the corner of his eye. 

“Good to know.” He’s smirking like the cat that got the cream, and Olivia rolls her eyes. 

“Were you worried I’d say no?” she teases back. 

“Were you worried I wasn’t going to ask?” 

Olivia doesn’t really have a response to that, so she doesn’t say anything. She has to admit that she’s thought about marrying Ryan. Or at least...not ever being with anyone else, which sort of abstractly implies marriage, she thinks. But she’d never put it into any exact, specific terms. She’d never wanted to box herself into any label or put any pressure on either of them. She wouldn’t want Ryan to ask just because he felt like he had to. But now that she knows… she doesn’t think she’s ever been happier than this. 

Ryan wiggles an arm around her, under her head, wedged against the windshield wipers in a way that can’t be comfortable, but he does it anyway, and Olivia rolls into his side, lays her head on his chest. 

“I love you, Olivia,” Ryan whispers to her hair, and she feels like she wants to laugh and cry at the same time. 

“I love you, too,” she whispers back.

**Author's Note:**

> Comments and kudos would mean the world to me! Thank you so much for taking a chance on this original work—I know most people around here are only here for fanfic! <3


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